Neuropsychology

Neuropsychology is a clinical and scientific discipline, at the meeting point of neurosciences and psychology. It was founded more than a hundred years ago, mostly from the observation of adults with brain injuries.

The role of the neuropsychologist is to analyse cognitive disorders, memory, attention, concentration, language, cognitive functions, and the emotional disorders associated with the functioning of the brain, in children as well as in adolescents, adults and elderly people.

It is a scientific medical discipline, based on advances in the knowledge of the brain and its functioning: functional anatomy, the way its structures are set in place, maturation mechanisms, validated clinical research protocols, recording of cerebral activity through functional imaging and electrical recording in different tasks, in connection with the whole of neuroscience and cognitive science.

The neuropsychologist is approved to carry out full assessments, which evaluate cognitive functioning as well as behavioural and psycho-affective disorders.

Why ask for a neuropsychological assessment?

To help manage the symptoms that follow heavy and sometimes chronic treatments, oncological or radiotherapeutic: forgetting appointments, losing keys, losing the thread of one’s thoughts. The assessment makes these difficulties measurable and guides suitable rehabilitation or psychological support.
To help diagnose certain conditions in elderly patients: Parkinson’s disease, Alzheimer’s type dementia, Korsakoff syndrome, fronto-temporal dementia, primary progressive aphasia.
To help diagnose learning disabilities: dyspraxia, dysgraphia, dyscalculia, dyslexia, attention disorder.
To help diagnose a delay in psychomotor development or in learning.
To help diagnose depression or anxiety disorders.
To determine the extent of brain lesions at a given moment: stroke, epilepsy, head injury, side effects of heavy treatments.
To then make care possible, if patients need it or want it, through rehabilitation, psychotherapy, support or relaxation, and to refer them to other health professionals: speech therapist, psychomotor therapist, occupational therapist, neurologist.

What the assessment evaluates

Thanks to the standardised tools available to us, we can evaluate:

the different types of memory in the verbal and visual field: autobiographical memory, semantic memory, episodic memory, working memory;
intellectual efficiency, through the WAIS and WISC scales;
executive functions, which conduct cognition: the capacity for judgment, reasoning, planning, strategy, inhibition and mental flexibility, by coordinating actions and thoughts directed towards a goal and by stepping in whenever a situation is not routine;
attention, sustained, selective and divided, and concentration;
instrumental functions: language, fine motor skills, praxis, calculation;
visuo-spatial and neuro-visual functions;
and, not least, emotional and behavioural disorders.

How the assessment unfolds

1An interview, called a case history, with the patient and with the family. This interview helps us understand the concerns of patients and of those close to them, and examine all the medical, psychological, occupational and educational information.
2After the interview, I look for the tests best suited to each set of difficulties. Every assessment is tailored and may be carried out over several sessions, depending on age, on the disorders and on what the patient asks for.
3The results are given back, right after the tests have been taken.
4A detailed written report is sent, by post or by email, as soon as possible after the assessment, to the patient and the family, as well as to everyone involved in their care.