Abstract
Auditory vocal hallucinations are sometimes observed in temporal-lobe epilepsy, but
are a frequent sign of psychosis and may rarely be mistaken for the latter. Here we
report two patients who suffered from auditory vocal hallucinations, described as
unintelligible human voices perceived at their left side during epileptic seizures.
MEG revealed interictal epileptic discharges within the anterior partition of the
right superior temporal gyrus; signal-to-noise ratio of these discharges was overall
poor in EEG. The findings suggest that auditory vocal hallucinations without verbal
content can evolve in the right hemisphere and are probably independent of language
lateralization. This is in accordance with evidence from functional imaging, whereas
most previous reports of seizures with auditory vocal hallucinations were confined
to the left hemisphere.
Keywords
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Article info
Publication history
Published online: April 07, 2011
Accepted:
March 15,
2011
Received in revised form:
February 2,
2011
Received:
October 27,
2010
Identification
Copyright
© 2011 Elsevier B.V. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.