Alien Hand Syndrom.....(creepy)

i saw a program about it in the TV

it was people that had been kinda cured from epilepsy.
they devoloved some kind thing with 1 of their hands (mostly the right one).

It's not like multiple personalities.

there was a woman who had woken up in the middle of the night strangeling herself with her right hand the "fight" took a few hours because it was her right hand and it's much more stronger than her left hand!!

there was this other woman who was filmed in a super marked...this is a creepy one..... her right hand where taking stuff down from the shelves and her left hand puted them up again.......Creepy stuff.....

there is about 5-10 people in the world with this desease.....

what do you think about this?.....and people this wasnt fake......

Reply reply

[Edited on 17-4-2004 by Greys]

[Edited on 19-4-2004 by Greys]

you mean Parkinson's disease?

Well I've never heard of it personally, sounds rather odd...Mulitple personality disorder perhaps?

idle hands watch the movie its good.

[Edited on 17-4-2004 by Trance]

One theory is that the person has split personalities where both fuction AT THE SAME TIME. However one "person" is trapped in a portion of the brain where they can only access the right hand and some of the senses of the body. After doing annoying things to amuse itself, eventualy it gets driven mad by being trapped in a body it can't control and normaly atempts to kill itself by strangling or stabbing the body.

Ah yes, Alien Hand syndrom

Alien Hand Syndrome has been most widely documented in cases where sufferers of epilepsy and seizures have had the two hemispheres of their brains separated to relieve the problems they suffer.
As a by-product of such a separation, many patients find that, quite literally, their left hand does not know what their right hand is doing.

Whilst a patient has complete control over one hand; they report, and it can be shown, that they have no control over the action of their other hand.

In at least one case it has been reported that a patient was happily driving home when the Alien Hand seized the wheel of the vehicle nearly causing an accident whilst in other cases, simply trying to write one's own name is thwarted by the other hand pushing the controlled hand away from the paper being written upon.

Despite various theories around a single consciousness interfering with itself on a subconscious level; it has been fairly widely accepted that the behaviour exhibited can be demonstrated to show that there is a separate personality that exists within each hemispshere of the brain that has seized control over each hand.

Well i remember watching a tv program about this and it was very interesting. You must wonder what the person is going through and how it feels not to be able to control your hand. Here is the medical term for it -

Alien hand syndrome: The feeling that one's hand is possessed by a force outside of ones control. The syndrome typically arises after trauma to the brain, after brain surgery or after a stroke or an infection of the brain. A person with the alien hand syndrome can feel sensation in the affected hand but thinks that the hand is not part of their body and that they have no control over its movement, that it belongs to an alien.

Different types of brain injuries cause different subtypes alien hand syndrome. For example, take an injury to the corpus callosum (the area of the brain which connects the two cerebral hemispheres, the two halves of the brain). Such an injury in a right-handed person can give rise to purposeful movements of the left hand, while injury to the brain's frontal lobe of the brain can trigger grasping and other purposeful movements in the dominant right hand. More complex hand movements such as unbuttoning or tearing of clothes are usually associated with brain tumors, aneurysms or strokes.

There is currently no treatment for alien hand. All a patient can do to control the problem is to keep the hand busy by having it hold an object.

Medical term

My grandfather had Parkinson's disease..but he died a few years back...God bless him


Yes, I doubt that is what you are talking about here, though, is it? Alien Hand Syndrome, I have never heard of that one..interesting..but, my question is this: How can you prove it is not a fake if it the hands moving? What I mean is, how can you prove that the person isn't controlling the hands and just saying they are doing it by themselves? I see no conclusive evidence to suggest that the hands have a 'mind' of its own???

-wD

With Parkinson's disease, the person has control over that body part unlike Alien Hand Syndrom.

Parkinson�s disease is a chronic, progressive neurodegenerative movement disorder. Tremors, rigidity, slow movement (bradykinesia), poor balance, and difficulty walking (called parkinsonian gait) are characteristic primary symptoms of Parkinson�s disease.

This a brief medical term for Parkinson's disease and we can see clearly that it differs alot from alien hand syndrom. AHS is a more frightening disease with no medication to treat it.

Originally posted by WeBDeviL
My grandfather had Parkinson's disease..but he died a few years back...God bless him

Yes, I doubt that is what you are talking about here, though, is it? Alien Hand Syndrome, I have never heard of that one..interesting..but, my question is this: How can you prove it is not a fake if it the hands moving? What I mean is, how can you prove that the person isn't controlling the hands and just saying they are doing it by themselves? I see no conclusive evidence to suggest that the hands have a 'mind' of its own???

-wD

i didnt mean "mind" i meant more like possesed well it did it by itself and its documented, and of course some people just do it 4 attention but it is real..

try to read what infinite is wrote

btw thanks infinite for the infomation

[Edited on 17-4-2004 by Greys]

tis ok Greys, that what im here for!

here's something take from here

"Naturalization" of the alien hand: case report.

Nicholas JJ, Wichner MH, Gorelick PB, Ramsey MM.

Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, Rush-Presbyterian-St. Luke's Medical Center, Chicago, IL 60612, USA.

The alien hand syndrome is an involuntary motor phenomenon that occurs infrequently and mostly in stroke patients. A case is reported of a 67-year-old man with left hemiparesis whose hand crept and crawled, especially at night, which caused him to awaken by grasping his collar. The disturbing nocturnal activity of the hand was stilled by placing it in a common oven mitt.

Publication Types:
Case Reports

PMID: 9440428 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

Above is an account, the part about " whose hand crept and crawled, especially at night" its a frightening picture

now here is a case report here

A senile Chinese female patient with alien hand syndrome of vascular etiology is reported. This case exhibited contradictive movement, left-lateral paresis and disorder of color discrimination, which might be a new subtype of the alien limb syndrome.

and finally here is the google search

Its either a multiple personality disorder or they have nerve damage in their hand. The story is just weird, especially the one about the lady strangling her self. If the hand gets too out of hand she should get it amputated.

Its very complex and hard to understand what really causes it.

This sounds like permanent partial demonic possession (or PPDP) to me. Only around 5 to 10 people have that, too.

DC

Originally posted by Nlive81
Its either a multiple personality disorder or they have nerve damage in their hand. The story is just weird, especially the one about the lady strangling her self. If the hand gets too out of hand she should get it amputated.

it isnt a nerve damage...... try to read the whole thing next time...... -.-

Originally posted by DeltaChaos
This sounds like permanent partial demonic possession (or PPDP) to me. Only around 5 to 10 people have that, too.

DC

interesting theory DC, im gonna look into PPDP to see if there is any simliarities

Originally posted by infinite
interesting theory DC, im gonna look into PPDP to see if there is any simliarities

Don't bother. I happen to know for a fact that the only similarity that you will find is that there are only 5 to 10 people who have it, none of whom I know...

I'm afraid of what you might find if you try to run a search on "PPDP" anyway.

DC

This is another explanation for AHS

Alien Hand Syndrome is an unusual mental disorder A mental illness is a psychiatric disorder that results in a disruption in a person's thinking, feeling, moods, and ability to relate to others. Psychiatrists generally attribute mental illness to organic/neurochemical causes that can be treated with psychiatric medication, psychotherapy, lifestyle adjustments and other supportive measures. Compare rational-emotive therapy.
Mental illness is distinct from the legal concept of insanity.
. in which one of the sufferer's hands seems to take on a life of its own. AHS is best documented in cases where a person has had the two hemispheres of their brain

For other articles about other subjects named brain see brain (disambiguation).

In the anatomy of animals, the brain, or encephalon, is the supervisory center of the nervous system. Although the brain is usually cited as the supervisory center of vertebrate nervous systems, the same term can also be used for the invertebrate central nervous system.
. surgically separated, a procedure sometimes used to relieve the symptoms of extreme cases of epilepsy Epilepsy is a chronic neurological condition characterized by recurrent unprovoked seizures. The condition is named from the Greek epilepsia ("a taking hold of or seizing"), and has in the past been associated with religious experiences and even demonic possession. Many neurologists prefer the less stigmatized term seizure disorder as a description of the condition.

Historically epilepsy was called the Sacred Disease because people thought the seizures experienced by people living with epilepsy were a form of attack by demons.
. It also occurs in some cases after other brain surgery, strokes The article is about stroke as medical term. For other uses of stroke, see stroke (disambiguation).

A stroke or cerebrovascular accident (CVA) occurs when the blood supply to a part of the brain is suddenly interrupted by occlusion (an ischemic stroke) or by hemorrhage (a hemorrhagic stroke). The latter occur when a blood vessel in the brain bursts, spilling blood into the spaces surrounding the brain cells or when a cerebral aneurysm ruptures.
, or infections An infection is the detrimental colonization of a host organism by a foreign species. The colonizing organism interferes with the normal functioning and perhaps the survival of the host. The infecting organism is referred to as a pathogen.

All multicellular organisms are colonized to some degree by extrinsic organisms, and the vast majority of these exist in either a symbiotic, commensal, or parasitic relationship with the host. An example of the former would be the anaerobic bacteria species which colonize the mammalian colon, an example of the latter would be the various species of staphylococcus which exist on human skin. Neither of these colonizations would be considered infections.


An Alien Hand sufferer can feel normal sensation in the hand, but believe that it is not part of their body and that they have no control over its movements. Alien hands can perform complex acts such as undoing buttons or removing clothing. Sometimes the sufferer will not be aware of what the hand is doing until it is brought to his or her attention. Sufferers of Alien Hand will often personify the rogue limb, for example believing it "possessed" by some intelligent spirit, and may fight or punish it in an attempt to control it.

There are several distinct subtypes of Alien Hand that appear to be associated with specific types of triggering brain injury. Damage to the corpus callosum

The corpus callosum is the largest white matter structure in the mammalian brain. It consists of mostly of contralateral axon projections. It appears as a wide, flat region just ventral (below) the cortex. It is missing in monotremes.

The corpus callosum connects the left and right cerebral hemispheres. Most (but certainly not all) communication between regions in different halves of the brain are carried over the corpus callosum.


Anatomy
In the human brain, the central sulcus separates the frontal lobe from the parietal lobe along the top of each cerebral cortex. The lateral sulcus separates the inferior frontal gyrus of lower frontal lobes from the temporal lobes.

link

Another site on;Subjective experience, involuntary movement, and posterior alien hand syndrome

The alien hand syndrome, as originally defined, was used to describe cases involving anterior corpus callosal lesions producing involuntary movement and a concomitant inability to distinguish the affected hand from an examiner's hand when these were placed in the patient's unaffected hand. In recent years, acceptable usage of the term has broadened considerably, and has been defined as involuntary movement occurring in the context of feelings of estrangement from or personification of the affected limb or its movements. Three varieties of alien hand syndrome have been reported, involving lesions of the corpus callosum alone, the corpus callosum plus dominant medial frontal cortex, and posterior cortical/subcortical areas. A patient with posterior alien hand syndrome of vascular aetiology is reported and the findings are discussed in the light of a conceptualisation of posterior alien hand syndrome as a disorder which may be less associated with specific focal neuropathology than are its callosal and callosal-frontal counterparts.
(J Neurol Neurosurg Psychiatry 2000;68:83-85)

Link

Originally posted by DeltaChaos

Originally posted by infinite
interesting theory DC, im gonna look into PPDP to see if there is any simliarities

Don't bother. I happen to know for a fact that the only similarity that you will find is that there are only 5 to 10 people who have it, none of whom I know...

I'm afraid of what you might find if you try to run a search on "PPDP" anyway.

DC

only found stuff about religion and demonic possesion. Nothing interesting

It Faxe-Ol for greys! Tak for the Great topic!

Here is a few case studies, which you might like to read.

COUNTRY OF PUBLICATION: ENGLAND

ABSTRACT: An 81 year old right handed woman developed a left alien hand syndrome characterised by involuntary movements of choking and hitting the face, neck, and shoulder. The patient showed multiple disorders of primary sensation, sensory processing, hemispatial attention, and visual association, as well as a combination of sensory, optic, and cerebellar ataxia (triple ataxia) of the left arm in the absence of motor neglect or hemiparesis. Imaging studies disclosed subacute infarction in the right thalamus, hippocampus, inferior temporal lobes, splenium of corpus callosum, and occipital lobe due to right posterior cerebral artery occlusion. This rare syndrome should be considered as a "sensory" or "posterior" form of the alien hand syndrome, to be distinguished from the "motor" or "anterior" form described more commonly.

MINOR MESH HEADINGS: Aged-; Aged,-80-and-over; Brain-Mapping; Cerebral-Infarction-physiopathology; Dominance,-Cerebral-physiology; Hemiplegia-physiopathology; Magnetic-Resonance-Imaging; Neurologic-Examination; Sensation-Disorders-diagnosis; Sensation-Disorders-physiopathology; Tomography,-Emission-Computed

MAJOR MeSH HEADINGS: *Attention-physiology; *Awareness-physiology; *Cerebral-Infarction-diagnosis; *Hand-innervation; *Hemiplegia-diagnosis; *Laterality-physiology; *Motor-Activity-physiology

Link


Found an interesting study on a condition called split brain, it was on the same search as AHS.

The Split brain
Eran Zaidel, Dahlia W. Zaidel and Joseph E. Bogen
1. Terminology


The term split-brain has several meanings. Applied to the human, it denotes complete sectioning of the corpus callosum, an operation which is usually performed for medically intractable, multifocal epilepsy (Reeves and Roberts 1995). In the experimental animal, such as the cat or monkey, it usually implies both callosal section and a split optic chiasm; this makes it possible to restrict visual information to one hemisphere merely by coveting one eye. In the human with intact chiasm, restriction of visual input to one hemisphere requires restriction of the visual stimuli to one or the other visual hemifield. Our split-brain patients had complete cerebral commissurotomy (including anterior commissure, dorsal and ventral hippocampal commissures, and, in some cases, the massa intermedia). But it is now common to use the term split-brain to refer to cases of complete callosotomy alone, since they manifest most of the same signs and symptoms.

link

Originally posted by Nlive81
Its either a multiple personality disorder or they have nerve damage in their hand. The story is just weird, especially the one about the lady strangling her self. If the hand gets too out of hand she should get it amputated. [/quote

I've actually heard of this; though it's quite rare.
It's kinda nifty, too. I don't know much about it, but it strikes me that it's essentially a physical manifestation (albeit, quite severe) of a mental disorder. Neat stuff.

I suppose it leaves it open, then, do you treat the cause or the symptom? :-X Goodbye hand, or hello brain chemical treatments?]