Stroke Clinical Manifestations Summary
1. Motor Loss
• Hemiplegia: Paralysis on one side caused by damage to opposite brain side
• Hemiparesis: Weakness on one side
• Dysphagia: Difficulty swallowing
• Bladder & Bowel: Loss of control
• Damage on one brain side causes opposite side symptoms
• Hypertonia: Increased muscle tone, spastic paralysis
• Ataxia: Unsteady gait
• Spasticity: Abnormal increase in muscle tone
• Loss/decrease in deep tendon reflexes early (flaccid paralysis), reflexes return with spasticity after 48 hours
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2. Communication Loss / Cognition
• Dysarthria: Difficulty forming words
• Dysphasia: Impaired speech
• Aphasia: Loss or defect of speech
• Expressive Aphasia: Can’t speak
• Receptive Aphasia: Can’t understand speech
• Agraphia: Difficulty writing
• Alexia: Reading problems
• Apraxia: Inability to perform learned motor actions
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3. Perceptual Loss: Visual-Perceptual
• Visual pathway damage causes dysfunction
• Hemianopsia: Loss of half of visual field in both eyes (homonymous)
• Patients tend to look toward lesion side
• Photophobia: Sensitivity to light
• Diplopia: Double vision
• Ptosis: Drooping eyelid
• Visual-spatial disturbances (often right hemisphere damage)
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4. Sensory Loss
• Paresthesia: Numbness and tingling
• Loss of proprioception (sense of body position and motion)
• Agnosia: Can’t recognize familiar objects despite normal sensation
1May 16, 2025 432 6
