Recovery of visual emotion recognition after mild ischemic stroke

We investigated the course of recovery of emotion recognition impairments during the first year after mild stroke. Furthermore, we studied whether long-term emotion recognition impairments are related to behavioural problems and mood problems. Patient recruitment took place at the stroke unit of a general hospital. Fifty-eight mild ischaemic stroke patients underwent neuropsychological assessments of emotion recognition and overall cognition at 6-8 weeks and 1-year post-stroke. At follow-up, questionnaires were administered to identify behavioural problems and mood problems. Emotion recognition scores of patients were compared to scores of 109 healthy controls that were matched according to age, sex and educational level to identify impairments. Baseline patient emotion recognition scores were compared to the patient scores at follow-up to investigate recovery. In this group of mild stroke patients, emotion recognition was impaired compared with healthy controls, with no recovery over time. One year after stroke emotion recognition was impaired in 31% of the mild stroke participants. At 1-year post-stroke, impaired emotion recognition was associated with overall cognitive impairment and self-reported behavioural problems, but not with mood. Even in mild stroke, emotion recognition is on average impaired in the long term and related to behavioural problems. A substantial portion of mild stroke patients have impairments in emotion recognition both in the subacute phase as well as in the long term. Early assessment of emotion recognition is important to identify patients at risk of developing behavioural problems. Appropriate and early treatment might be necessary to prevent persisting problems.