EDITORIAL COMMENTARIES
Pathological yawning
Can stroke localisation be used to map out the neural network for yawning behaviour?
Correspondence to:
Dr Olivier Walusinski, 20 rue de Chartres, Brou 28160, France; walusinski@baillement.com
What are the neuroanatomical structures involved in repetitive yawning during stroke?
| The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below. |
Since the 19th century, cases of pathological yawning have occasionally been published in medical journals. In this issue of J Neurol Neurosurg Psychiatry, Singer et al1 present the first study to focus specifically on yawning during acute stroke affecting the middle cerebral artery territory (see page 1253).
None of seven patients suffering from abnormal repetitive yawning had diencephalic lesions. Classically, yawning is thought to originate in archaic brain structures common to all vertebrates. It appears to be a powerful muscular stretch which recruits specific control systems, particularly the paraventricular nucleus of the hypothalamus, locus coeruleus and reticular activating system; these structures explain its ability to increase arousal. A persistent vestige of the past, yawning has survived evolution with little variation.2 Singer et al1 suggest that neocortical brain areas have an inhibitory effect on the paraventricular nucleus of the hypothalamus, and that in certain middle cerebral
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- Yawning in acute anterior circulation stroke
- Oliver C Singer, Marek C Humpich, Heiner Lanfermann, and Tobias Neumann-Haefelin
J. Neurol. Neurosurg. Psychiatry 2007 78: 1253-1254.[Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
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