Alien Hand Syndrome (AHS)

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According to Goldstein in 1908, Alien hand syndrome (AHS) was labelled as a disorder related to the inability to do certain actions, also known as apraxia. “It was named main etrangere (foreign hand) or alien hand by Brion and Jedynak in 1972” (Pooyania, Mohr, and Gray, 2011). AHS is an extraordinary neurological disorder where an individual display unusual, involuntary movements that happen with one hand (sometimes two hands in rare cases), that are not controlled by the individual. It is as though the hand operates alone and against the will of the individual and strangely, without any commands, the involuntary actions of the affected hand serve a purpose. For example, the individual’s right hand reaches for a door knob to open the door …show more content…
2014 states that in 2005, epilepsy was described as a disorder of the brain in which individuals who experience seizures that cause abrupt and sometimes brief muscle jerks or long-lasting uncontrolled muscle spasms. Sometimes epilepsy can be treated with drugs and as Kara had been suffering from epilepsy since a young age, the operation was vital. The surgeon who operated on Kara, removed the corpus callosum, that is the fibrous strap which keeps the two parts of the brain in connection. “Whenever I am out, I would bring my handbag with me. My alien hand removes items from my bag and later in the day, I realise that I had lost items before I knew what was going on” (Alien Hand Syndrome…oh, it’s real, 2011). The surgery restored Kara’s health and freed her from epileptic seizures, but consequently, it did not take long until the doctor discovered that she behaved in an unusual manner. Especially during post-surgery reviews, the doctor would observe that Kara’s left hand is active without her knowing that something is going on. He would ask Kara if she knew that her left hand was moving, for example, unbuttoning her blouse. “When the doctor told me that my left hand was undoing my blouse, I was mortified! It was shocking and confusing! So, I began to re-do the buttons on my blouse, only to have them undone again by my alien hand! There was something wrong” (Alien Hand Syndrome…oh, it’s real, 2011). The doctor informed Kara that the right hemisphere of her brain controls her left hand and is also largely in control for spatial cognition, identifying patterns of movement and consequently, since the severance of the two hemisphere’s, Kara’s right side of the brain refused to be dominated by the left side and displayed the actions of her hands at constant battle with each other (The Brain: A Secret history 3of3 Broken Brains, 2016). This issue of AHS can be viewed from several different perspectives, for instance, Kara did not find

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