Preliminary evidence for a fronto‐parietal dysfunction in able‐bodied participants with a desire for limb amputation

Abstract

These results document the existence of an unusual condition in able-bodied participants characterized by a person's desire for the amputation of one or more particular limbs. Left-sidedness, limb specificity and somatosensory disturbances of the affected limb are suggestive of abnormal brain mechanisms in right fronto-parietal cortex. Based on this association we suggest that desire for limb amputation may be conceptualized as asomatognosia due to disturbed integration of multi-sensory information of the affected body parts into a coherent cerebral representation of the own body. This suggestion has to be regarded with caution as we did not perform any neurological examination.