Nasal mucous velocity was estimated by following the motion of radiopaque discs of Teflon by means of a fluoroscopic image intensifier. From 5 to 10 discs were deposited on the superior surface of the inferior turbinate with a forceps. No local anesthesia was employed and the subjects experienced no discomfort. The linear velocity of the discs was obtained by playing the videotape onto a television monitor, measuring distance with a ruler, and dividing by elapsed time. Duplicate runs of 1-2 min, 15 min apart were very reproducible but runs at 4-h intervals or daily over a 5-day period had a coefficient of variation of 30%. Average nasal velocity for individual ranged from 0 to 22.5 mm/min and group means ranged from 6. 8 to 10.8 mm/min. There was no statistically significant difference in nasal mucous velocity between young and elderly subjects nor was there a sexual difference. The saccharin test of nasal mucous transport was unsatisfactory because of inability to repeat the test more often than 1-2 h and its propensity to produce mild discomfort in a significant number of subjects. Saccharin times did not correlate significantly with values of nasal mucous velocity.

✓A bilingual pediatric patient who underwent tumor resection was mapped extraoperatively using cortical stimulation to preserve English and Hebrew languages. The authors mapped both languages by using 4 tasks: 1) English visual naming, 2) Hebrew visual naming, 3) read English/respond Hebrew, and 4) Hebrew reading. Essential cortical sites for primary and secondary languages were compared, photographically recorded, and plotted onto a schematic brain of the patient. Three types of sites were found in this patient: 1) multiuse sites (multiple tasks, both languages) in frontal, temporal, and parietal areas; 2) single-task sites (1 task, both languages) in postcentral and parietal areas; and 3) single-use sites (1 task, 1 language) in frontal, temporal, and parietal areas. These results lend support to the concept that bilingual patients can have distinct cortical representations of each language and of different language tasks, in addition to overlapping or shared sites that support both languages and multiple tasks.

Chronic injury to the brain from seizure activity is associated with decreased language skills in pediatric patients, as measured on neuropsychological tests for language function and academic achievement. This makes the study of language in patients with epilepsy clinically necessary. Functional magnetic resonance imaging and direct electrical cortical stimulation have been used to evaluate aspects of cortical language processing in healthy adults and in adults with epilepsy or other neurological insults. Results of these studies help to locate cortical language areas that are involved with modality-specific language processing (visual naming, auditory naming, sentence-completion, and repetition) and the neuroplasticity of language areas in the setting of neurological injury and reorganization. A better understanding of language processing contributes to a more efficient and efficacious electrical cortical stimulation mapping of language areas for patients with intractable epilepsy who are undergoing preresection evaluation. Most of the current literature on localization and reorganization of cortical language areas in the setting of epilepsy concerns the adult patient population, whereas the literature on pediatric patients is substantially lacking in comparison. This article reviews the conclusions drawn thus far from Wada, magnetoencephalography, functional magnetic resonance imaging, and electrical cortical stimulation language studies on types of language reorganization seen in pediatric patients with intractable temporal lobe epilepsy and the clinical factors associated with reorganization, and proposes future directions of research to further the academic and clinical understanding of language processing in pediatric patients.

The present study explored the correlation between lactate as detected by MR spectroscopy (MRS) and blood oxygenation level dependent (BOLD) responses in male children during auditory‐based language tasks. All subjects (N = 8) participated in one proton echo planar spectroscopic imaging (PEPSI) and one functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) session that required phonological and lexical judgments to aurally presented stimuli. Valid PEPSI data was limited in the frontal areas of the brain due to the magnetic susceptibility of the eye orbits and frontal sinuses. Findings from the remainder of the brain indicate that subjects show a significant consistency across imaging techniques in the left temporal area during the lexical task, but not in any other measurable area or during the phonological task. Magn Reson Med 45:217–225, 2001. © 2001 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.