Stroke and restricted sensory syndromes.

There have been sporadic case reports of a restricted sensory syndrome caused by stroke, most often as a cheiro-oral syndrome. We describe 14 patients with stroke who showed various restricted sensory syndromes and correlated their symptoms with the radiological findings. Twelve had small infarcts and two had haemorrhages; six had lesions in the posterolateral thalamus, five in the pontine tegmentum, one in the lenticulocapsular area, one in the frontoparietal subcortex, and one in the frontal white matter. Sensory abnormalities were in the perioral area, hands, fingers, feet and toes, in various combinations. Two patients with pontine stroke had bilateral sensory abnormalities associated with paramedian lesions. Thus, strokes in the sensory pathways can cause various restricted sensory syndromes of which 'cheiro-oral syndrome' is only one variant. Magnetic resonance imaging is of interest in the clinicoradiological correlation, and helps elucidate the somatotopic pattern of the human sensory pathways.