Organic Psychiatry

Question 1

Describe some bedside tests of frontal lobe function

Answer 1

• Verbal fluency and initiation
  
  • Words starting with “s” in 1 min (< 10 abnormal)
• Abstract thinking
  
  • Interpret a proverb
  • Explain linkage between “praise and punishment”, “banana and orange”, “poem and statue”
• Clock drawing test (executive and praxis)
  
  • Draw hand at 10 past 5
• Response inhibition
  
  • Draw a alternating series of triangles and squares, ask patient to copy. Perseveration if they just copy one shape