Hemiparesis

see also Ipsilateral hemiparesis.

Is weakness on one side of the body. It is less severe than hemiplegia — the total paralysis of the arm, leg, and trunk on one side of the body. Thus, the patient can move the impaired side of their body, but with reduced muscular strength.

Hemiparesis develops in response to a wide range of neurological disorders. The presence of concomitant cranial nerve signs or facial weakness generally prompts a search for cerebral etiologies such as stroke, neoplasms or inflammatory processes, while it may occasionally be due to a lesion located in the high cervical spinal cord ¹⁾.

Some of the conditions that have hemiparesis as either an indicative symptom or as a result of the condition itself include migraine, head trauma, muscular dystrophy, stroke, brain tumors, or cerebral palsy.

Hemiparesis is a major symptom of chronic subdural hematoma (CSDH). However, its severity does not always correlate with hematoma size, and some patients demonstrate mild hemiparesis despite having a large hematoma ²⁾.

¹⁾

Aminoff MJ. Weakness and Paralysis. In: Longo DL, Fauci AS, Kasper DL, Hauser SL, Jameson JL, Loscalzo J, editors. Harrison’s Principles of Internal Medicine. 18th ed. New York: McGraw Hill; 2012. pp. 181–6.

²⁾

Tomita Y, Yamada SM, Yamada S, Matsuno A. Subdural tension on the brain in chronic subdural hematoma patients is related to hemiparesis, but not to headache or recurrence. World Neurosurg. 2018 Jul 31. pii: S1878-8750(18)31670-X. doi: 10.1016/j.wneu.2018.07.192. [Epub ahead of print] PubMed PMID: 30075268.