Left USN (15.82%) was more frequent than right USN (9.25%). Demographic and stroke characteristics were comparable between groups. The lateralized attentional deficit was most severe in left USN. USN in both peripersonal and extrapersonal space was more frequently left-sided in nature. Search efficiency was lower in left USN. Balance was poorer in right USN. No differences between left and right USN were found for cognitive ability, communication, motor strength, mobility, and self-care. Most patients with left USN had right-hemispheric lesions, whereas patients with right USN could have lesions in either the left or the right hemisphere. To conclude, left and right USN are both common after stroke. Although the lateralized attention deficit is worse in left than in right USN, consequences at the level of physical functioning and physical independence are largely comparable. From a clinical perspective, it is important to systematically screen for USN, both after right- and after left-hemisphere damage.

No beneficial effects of PA over SA in the subacute phase poststroke were observed, which was comparable for situations of varying complexity. Heterogeneity of the syndrome, time post-stroke onset, and the content of treatment as usual are discussed. Basic knowledge on subtypes and recovery patterns would aid the development of tailored treatment.

The MAC is an ecological task in which both quantitative and qualitative data on neglect can be collected. In order to assess the presence of neglect and neglect severity in a dynamic way, the MAC could be administered in conjunction with neuropsychological assessment.

Background Visuo‐spatial neglect (VSN) is generally assessed with neuropsychological paper‐and‐pencil tasks, which are often not sensitive enough to detect mild and/or well‐compensated VSN. It is of utmost importance to develop dynamic tasks, resembling the dynamics of daily living. Objective A simulated driving task was used to assess (1) differences in performance (i.e., position on the road and magnitude of sway) between patients with left‐ and right‐sided VSN, recovered VSN, without VSN, and healthy participants; (2) the relation between average position and VSN severity; and (3) its diagnostic accuracy in relation to traditional tasks. Methods Stroke inpatients were tested with a cancellation task, the Catherine Bergego Scale and the simulated driving task. Results Patients with left‐sided VSN and recovered VSN deviated more regarding position on the road compared to patients without VSN. The deviation was larger in patients with more severe VSN. Regarding diagnostic accuracy, 29% of recovered VSN patients and 6% of patients without VSN did show abnormal performance on the simulated driving task. The sensitivity was 52% for left‐sided VSN. Right‐sided VSN was not well detected, probably due to the asymmetric layout. Conclusions Based on these results, the simulated driving task should not be the only task to assess VSN, especially in its current form. Given the heterogenic nature of VSN, the assessment should always consist of several tasks varying in nature and complexity and include a dynamic task to detect mild and/or recovered VSN. A symmetric design should be used when designing novel tasks to assess right‐sided VSN.

Disorders in spatial exploration can be expressed in a disorganized fashion of target cancellation. There is debate regarding whether disorganized search is related to stroke in general, to right brain damage or to unilateral spatial neglect (USN) in particular. In this study, 280 stroke patients and 37 healthy control subjects performed a computerized shape cancellation test. We investigated the number of perseverations and several outcome measures regarding disorganized search: Consistency of search direction (best r), distance between consecutive cancelled targets and intersections with paths between previous cancelled targets. We compared performance between patients with left and right brain damage (L, R) and with and without USN (USN+, USN-), resulting in four subgroups: LUSN-, RUSN-, LUSN+, and RUSN+. Higher numbers of intersections were found for the left brain- and right brain-damaged patients with USN and for the right brain-damaged patients without USN, compared to healthy control subjects. Furthermore, right brain-damaged patients with USN showed a higher number of intersections compared to right brain-damaged patients without USN and compared to left brain-damaged patients with USN. To conclude, disorganized search was most strongly related to the neglect syndrome, and patients with more severe USN were even more impaired.

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Number of tables: 4Parts of the results were presented on a poster at the 7 th scientific meeting of the Federation of the European Societies of Neuropsychology. It was not published in the form of an article before.