Descriptive Halstead-Reitan study of nonimpact mild traumatic brain injury

The purpose of this study was to investigate possible neuropsychological differences in Halstead-Reitan characteristics between motor vehicle accident litigants and insurance claimants that sustained uncomplicated mild traumatic brain injury (mTBI) and did or did not sustain direct impact to the head (i.e., Impact vs. Nonimpact mTBI), and to compare these clinical groups with a control group that did not suffer mTBI (No mTBI). The Tactile Form Recognition Test (TFR) was the only level of performance test in the Halstead-Reitan Battery (HRB) that generated statistically significant differences. The TFR resembles a complex reaction time test. TFR response time was significantly longer for Nonimpact mTBI patients than for Impact mTBI and No mTBI participants. Frequency comparisons of abnormal score patterns demonstrated that Nonimpact patients produced significantly more aberrant Impairment Index vs. FSIQ score patterns than Impact and No mTBI participants. Given the components of the score pattern, this finding suggests that Nonimpact patients may experience less recovery from neuropsychological deficits than Impact participants. Complex perceptual reaction times and score patterns comparing sensitive and "hold" test results may represent heuristic avenues of future research in the study of compensation-seeking Nonimpact and Impact mTBI patients.

Halstead-Reitan characteristics of nonimpact and impact mTBI litigants and insurance claimants

Sweeney¹,

Johnson

2017

An index of decline or recovery following nonimpact and impact mTBI

Sweeney¹,

Johnson

2017

This study investigated the degree to which litigants/insurance claimants sustaining Nonimpact mild traumatic brain injury (mTBI) in motor vehicle accidents differed from compensation-seeking motor vehicle accident victims that suffered Impact mTBI in terms of neuropsychological decline/recovery, using as a control litigants/insurance claimants that did not experience mTBI in motor vehicle accidents. A clinical index (C-Voc) was employed as the dependent measure for decline/recovery, consisting of T-score algebraic differences between a highly sensitive neurocognitive measure (Category Test) and a relatively insensitive "hold" measure (Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale Vocabulary subtest). Nonimpact mTBI subjects showed significantly greater neurocognitive decline than Impact mTBI participants and, interestingly, Impact mTBI individuals did not differ significantly from individuals with no diagnosis of mTBI. These findings suggest that Nonimpact subjects may experience significantly greater persistent neurocognitive residua of mTBI than Impact participants.

Preliminary study of spatial cognition relating to nonimpact mTBI

Sweeney¹,

Slade²

2018

Sweeney and Johnson found that individuals that sustained mild traumatic brain injury without impact to the head (Nonimpact) demonstrated significantly slower performance than participants that suffered mild traumatic brain injury with impact to the head and normal controls on the Tactile Form Recognition Test (TFR). The current study explored the spatial cognition of three groups of Nonimpact participants classified as Deficient, Perfectly Normal, and Normal on the basis of TFR response time. Dependent variables consisted of neuropsychological tests requiring tactile- and/or visual-spatial perception and memory. Univariate analysis of variance (ANOVAs) were carried out, with false positive findings controlled by adjusting p-values using the False Detection Rate. Deficient TFR individuals performed at significantly inefficient levels relative to both Perfectly Normal and Normal TFR patients on tactile-spatial tests requiring the perception and recognition of multiple geometric configurations with the left hand, tactile-spatial memory for these shapes, and identification of numbers traced on the fingertips of the right hand. TFR Deficiency appeared to negatively affect performance on visual-spatial tests involving memory for abstract concepts and rapid association of numbers and geometric shapes, but only in relation to Perfectly Normal participants.