Fine Touch and Crude Touch
Fine touch, (or discriminative touch), is a sensory modality which allows a subject to sense and localise touch. The form of touch where localisation is not possible is known as crude touch. The posterior column-medial lemniscus pathway is the pathway responsible for the sending of fine touch information to the cerebral cortex of the brain.
Crude touch (or non-discriminative touch) is a sensory modality which allows the subject to sense that something has touched them, without being able to localize where they were touched (contrasting "fine touch"). Its fibres are carried in the spinothalamic tract. Unlike the fine touch which is carried in the dorsal column
As fine touch normally works in parallel to crude touch, a person will be able to localize touch until fibres carrying fine touch (Posterior column-medial lemniscus pathway) have been disrupted. Then the subject will feel the touch, but be unable to identify where they were touched.
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Famous quotes containing the words fine, touch and/or crude:
“It’s a fine land, the west land, for hearts as tired as mine,
Apple orchards blossom there, and the air’s like wine.”
—John Masefield (1878–1967)
“We mustn’t touch them yet, but see and see!
And what was green would by and by be gold.
Their name was called the Gold Hesperidee.”
—Robert Frost (1874–1963)
“On the pavement
of my trampled soul
the soles of madmen
stamp the prints of rude, crude words.”
—Vladimir Mayakovsky (1893–1930)