Table 1. This tables shows demographic data, including neurological diagnoses.
“Stroke” includes hemorrhagic and ischemic stroke, “neuromuscular” includes Guillain-Barré syndrome, chronic inflammatory demyelinating polyradiculopathy, Isaacs’ syndrome, Pompe’s disease and multifocal motor neuropathy, “epilepsy” denotes epilepsy with or without structural cause on magnetic resonance imaging.
| Healthy volunteers | Neurological patients | Neurological patientsa | ICU patients, MCS or CS | ICU patients, coma | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| N | 20 | 20 | 21 | 2 | 5 |
| Female | 10 (50%) | 9 (45%) | 8 (38%) | 2 (66%) | 2 (40%) |
| Age in years, median (IQR) | 34.5 (29–47) | 60.5 (51–68) | 50 (41–70) | 34 (34–34) | 62 (55–64) |
| Stroke | – | 2 | 2 | 1b | 0 |
| SAH | – | 0 | 1 | 0 | 2 |
| TBI | – | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 |
| Epilepsy | – | 5 | 2 | 0 | 0 |
| Neuromuscular | – | 9 | 10 | 1 | 0 |
| Otherc | – | 4 | 6 | 0 | 1 |
Notes.
- CS
- conscious
- ICU
- intensive care unit
- IQR
- interquartile range
- MCS
- minimally conscious state
- N
- number of subjects
- SAH
- subarachnoid hemorrhage
- TBI
- traumatic brain injury
All mental arithmetic tasks involved 2 × 2-ciffered calculations (e.g., 33 × 32), except for 1 × 2-ciffered calculations (e.g., 8 × 32) in neurological patients indicated with (*).
This unsedated ICU patient in MCS with a pontine hemorrhagic stroke was examined twice at 7 days interval but failed to show command following during mental arithmetic in both sessions.
Other diagnoses, not listed above, include relapsing remitting multiple sclerosis, unspecified sensory disturbances, brain abscess, anoxic-ischemic encephalopathy and hemangioblastoma.