It is justified, as we chose a population of patients with right hemiplegia, to ask if this deficit could be related to apraxic symptoms.
Apraxia is defined as a disorder of learned movement not caused by weakness, akinesia, deafferentation, abnormality of tone, posture, abnormal movement such as tremors and chorea, intellectual deterioration, poor comprehension, or lack of cooperation.
Some authors have recorded up to 50% of right hemiplegic patients with apraxic disorders.
The presence in our study of a deficit of motor execution (force) prevents validation of any apraxia.
Moreover, as a left sided motor deficit exists, perhaps apraxic symptoms currently detected by practioners when they test the motor function of the supposed healthy side of right hemiplegic patients are not really related to apraxia and apraxia is sometimes overdiagnosed.
Ipsilateral motor deficits have already been reported in patients with hemispheric lesions affecting skilled sensory-motor tasks such as the pegboard task.
Conflicting results appeared concerning finger tapping and grip strength.
Some authors found a significant impairment which was not recorded by others.
Colebatch and Gandevia measured the moment created by an isometric effort in a population of 20 hemiplegic patients at different times after their stroke.
They also found an impairment of the supposed healthy side.
The deficit prevailed on shoulder abduction and wrist extension and the lower limb was globally affected.