Module 9 — Neurological Examination and Localization

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Lyrics

[Verse 1]
Before the scanner warms, before the contrast flows,
You map the nervous system where the damage shows,
Mental status first — is the patient tracking speech?
Or drifting into coma, consciousness out of reach?
Glasgow Coma Scale — eyes, verbal, motor, three domains,
Motor subscore weighs the heaviest in your claims,
Posturing or localising, that gap cuts deep,
FOUR score adds brainstem, catches what the numbers sleep

[Chorus]
Localise before imaging, every single time,
Pupil, drift, and reflex — read the clinical signs,
Afferent defect, Horner's, third nerve with a blown pupil wide,
Aneurysm 'til it's not — that's how surgeons think inside,
Eyes, verbal, motor, brainstem, field, and tone,
Name the level, name the side — then let the scanner show

[Verse 2]
Cranial nerves unwinding like a twelve-rung copper wire,
Confrontation fields reveal the chiasm from the gyrus fire —
Bitemporal hemianopia whispers sellar mass,
Homonymous quadrants trace the optic radiation's path,
Weber to the damaged ear, Rinne shows conduction's fall,
House-Brackmann grades the facial nerve from perfect down to crawl,
Oculocephalic doll's-eye reflex, corneal blink,
Gag and cough and breathing pattern — map the brainstem's link

[Chorus]
Localise before imaging, every single time,
Pupil, drift, and reflex — read the clinical signs,
Afferent defect, Horner's, third nerve with a blown pupil wide,
Aneurysm 'til it's not — that's how surgeons think inside,
Eyes, verbal, motor, brainstem, field, and tone,
Name the level, name the side — then let the scanner show

[Verse 3]
Pronator drift betrays the subtle upper motor loss,
MRC grades zero through to five across each cross,
Dissociated sensory — spinothalamic splits from dorsal column touch,
Syrinx draws that cape-like pattern, Brown-Séquard says as much,
Coordination falters with a cerebellar hand,
Gait apraxia, magnetic steps — frontal lobe command,
Normal pressure hydrocephalus — wet, wobbly, and slow to think,
Aphasia types, neglect, apraxia — map the cognitive brink

[Bridge]
In the smallest patients feel the fontanelle,
Head circumference percentiles — the numbers tell,
Sunsetting eyes and milestones missed by months,
Primitive reflexes lingering — that's the frontal's stunts,
Hunt-Hess grades the bleed that hasn't bled enough,
Fisher clots predict vasospasm, Spetzler-Martin maps the rough,
Karnofsky, mRS, and Engel close the loop,
Ten unseen cases — localise before the group

[Chorus]
Localise before imaging, every single time,
Pupil, drift, and reflex — read the clinical signs,
Afferent defect, Horner's, third nerve with a blown pupil wide,
Aneurysm 'til it's not — that's how surgeons think inside,
Eyes, verbal, motor, brainstem, field, and tone,
Name the level, name the side — then let the scanner show

← Module 8 — Neurophysiology and Cerebral Homeostasis | Module 10 — Neuroimaging →