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Course and Prognosis: Long‐Term Effectiveness of Antiepileptic Drug Treatment and Seizure Recurrence in Patients with Epilepsy
Author(s) -
Tanaka Hisashi,
Takeda Akio,
Okada Hisashi,
Izumi Masayuki,
Ishikawa Sawao
Publication year - 1992
Publication title -
psychiatry and clinical neurosciences
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.609
H-Index - 74
eISSN - 1440-1819
pISSN - 1323-1316
DOI - 10.1111/j.1440-1819.1992.tb00889.x
Subject(s) - epilepsy , medicine , electroencephalography , center (category theory) , psychiatry , chemistry , crystallography
We studied the rate of seizure recurrence in 334 patients with epilepsy who had received antiepileptic drug (AED) therapy for at least eight years. During the three-year "observation period" (April 1985-March 1988), 163 or 48.8% of the 334 patients were considered to be seizure-free. Seizures were absent in 53 or 81.5% of 65 patients with idiopathic generalized epilepsy, 48 or 40% of 120 with temporal lobe epilepsy, 39 or 39.4% of 99 with partial epilepsy other than those involving the temporal lobe, 2 or 8.3% of 24 with symptomatic generalized epilepsy and 21 or 80.8% of 26 with other epilepsies. Of the 163 patients, 15 or 9.2% suffered seizure(s) during the three-year "follow-up period" (April 1988-March 1991). There was no difference among the different types of epilepsy with respect to seizure recurrence rates. Compared with the 15 patients whose seizures recurred, more of the 148 patients with nonrecurring seizures received AED monotherapy (p < 0.05). However, no significant differences were seen between the two groups for other background factors.