Language disorder in a right-hander after occlusion of the right anterior cerebral artery

A right-handed woman developed left hemiparesis and a language disturbance. At autopsy, there was infarction in the territory of the right anterior cerebral artery, involving, among other structures, the supplementary motor area. This brain region has been considered to play a role in speech, but whether the language disorder that follows its destruction is truly aphasic is controversial. Our patient does not answer that question, but if her disturbed language is viewed as aphasic, she represents the fourth autopsy case of "crossed aphasia in a dextral" and the first, with or without autopsy, after right anterior cerebral artery occlusion.