Developmental Gerstmann's syndrome: A distinct clinical entity of learning disabilities

The symptom complex of finger anemia, right-left disorientation, dysgraphia, and dyscalculia constitutes Gerstmann's syndrome. It is mostly described in adults and is caused by acquired lesions of the dominant parietal lobe. It is infrequently described in children with learning disabilities and has been designated developmental Gerstmann's syndrome. Developmental Gerstmann's syndrome goes unnoticed if not specifically sought by clinicians. A detailed evaluation will reveal subtle neurologic deficits, behavioral problems, and neuropsychologic and specific speech and language abnormalities. Ten such patients are reported; six of the children demonstrated improvement with intensive speech training, Early identification and intervention is therefore crucial, and even more important in cultures in which students are required to be biliterate or triliterate, further increasing the constraints on writing. A selective writing, reading, or calculation abnormality in the presence of normal oral communication triggers several interesting possibilities for the brain mechanisms behind normal language processing. Similarly, the association of acalculia with finger anemia and agraphia with right-left disorientation may have specific implications in the neuropsychologic processing of the evolution of calculation and writing. A theoretical possibility of oral and written language processing from the observation of the language behavior of these children is also described. (C) 2000 by Elsevier Science Inc, All rights reserved.