Article

Mild traumatic brain injury (mTBI) and posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) are
prevalent dual impairments in veterans returning from the wars in Iraq and
Afghanistan. Attention problems are a common self-reported complaint of veterans
with mTBI, but relatively few studies have investigated the types and levels of
behavioral attentional deficits present in veterans with mTBI and PTSD. The
purpose of this study was to compare visual attentional performance between
samples of veterans with both mTBI and PTSD (mTBI+PTSD), PTSD only, and a control
group. Overall, the attentional responses of the mTBI+PTSD group were slower than
those of the PTSD and control groups. The response times were also more variable,
suggesting difficulty with attentional vigilance. Additionally, we found evidence
of hemispheric asymmetries in attentional performance. Participants with
mTBI+PTSD were less efficient in orienting visual attention to stimuli flashed to
the left visual field (LVF), suggesting a right hemisphere deficit. Overall, we
found that veterans who had sustained an mTBI and had a coexisting PTSD diagnosis
displayed longer response times and were less accurate than the PTSD and control
groups, especially when cues were presented to the LVF.

Langue : ANGLAIS