Balint's syndrome is a rare neuropsychological disorder made up of three co-occurring visual impairments: simultanagnosia, the inability to perceive more than one object in the visual field at a time; oculomotor apraxia, difficulty voluntarily directing the eyes to fixate on a target; and optic ataxia, difficulty using vision to guide the hand toward an object. First identified in 1909 by the Austro-Hungarian neurologist Rezso Balint, it usually results from damage to both parieto-occipital regions of the brain, most often following an acute stroke, though it can also arise from degenerative conditions such as Alzheimer's disease or from traumatic brain injury; because clinicians unfamiliar with the syndrome can mistake it for blindness, psychosis or dementia, it is frequently misdiagnosed. This description is adapted from Wikipedia contributors under CC BY-SA 4.0; changes were made. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/
Facts
First Described YearIt was named in 1909 for the Austro-Hungarian neurologist and psychiatrist Rezső Bálint who first identified it. (w-bbfill-psychology6-0926) Classification
Type of Phenomenon Diagnostic ChapterNeurocognitive Disorders 1 Sources
1. Balint's Syndrome (Wikipedia)
Lead section
Bálint's syndrome is an uncommon and incompletely understood triad of severe neuropsychological impairments: inability to perceive the visual field as a whole (simultanagnosia), difficulty in fixating the eyes (oculomotor apraxia), and inability to move the hand to a specific object by using vision (optic ataxia).
lead section, diagnostic-chapter classification
Balint's syndrome is an uncommon and incompletely understood triad of severe neuropsychological impairments: inability to perceive the visual field as a whole (simultanagnosia), difficulty in fixating the eyes (oculomotor apraxia), and inability to move the hand to a specific object by using vision (optic ataxia).
View the Source2. Wikipedia: Bálint's syndrome
Wikipedia article textQuote, Wikipedia article text
It was named in 1909 for the Austro-Hungarian neurologist and psychiatrist Rezső Bálint who first identified it.
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