A patient with persistent prosopagnosia after right posterior cerebral artery territorial infarction

Abstract

Prosopagnosia is a specific form of visual agnosia that impairs the ability to recognise familiar faces. Prosopagnosia is typically considered for bilateral ventro-occipitotemporal lesions involving the fusiform face area. A 72-year-old right-handed woman presented with persistent inability to recognise familiar faces after cerebral infarction. Brain magnetic resonance imaging demonstrated infarction in the right medial occipital lobe, including the lingual and fusiform gyri. She showed decreased facial recognition abilities in a face recognition test consisting of famous Koreans. This case suggests that there can be individual-specific degrees of hemispheric dominance for face processing, and unilateral right occipitotemporal lesion is sufficient to produce persistent prosopagnosia.