Cerebral palsy is one of the most common chronic childhood disorders, occurring in 2-2.5 of every 1000 live births; it is a persistent disorder of movement and posture caused by non-progressive lesions of the immature brain. Epilepsy is an important problem in children with cerebral palsy, with past studies showing an average incidence of epilepsy in about one-third in cases of cerebral palsy. ...

Epilepsy may present as a symptom of many neurological disorders and often an etiological explanation cannot be identified. There is growing evidence that autoimmune mechanisms might have a role in some patients. The evidence for immunological mechanisms in epilepsy can be examined within the following three main areas: the childhood epilepsy syndromes, epilepsy associated with other immunologi...

The prognosis of partial epilepsy in childhood (excluding cases of benign partial epilepsy) was studied; the average follow up period was 7.4 years. Improvement rate of seizure status was 82.3%. We studied favourable prognostic factors and found that those most often associated with seizure improvement were familial convulsions and idiopathic forms, no generalised seizures before partial onset,...

OBJECTIVE To elucidate all of the characteristics of childhood epilepsy, we performed a long-term follow-up study on the patients who visited Okayama University Hospital. SUBJECTS AND METHODS We retrospectively investigated the patients who were involved in the previous epidemiological study and visited Okayama University Hospital for a period of 10years after December 31, 1999. RESULTS Ove...

OBJECTIVE We compared associations of epilepsy remission status and severity as well as psychiatric and other comorbidities with child and parent-proxy reports of health-related quality of life (HRQoL) in adolescents previously diagnosed with epilepsy. METHODS In a prospective, community-based study of newly diagnosed childhood epilepsy, HRQoL of 277 children was assessed 8 to 9 years after d...

AIM In this retrospective study, we evaluated the clinical responses to antiepileptic drug (AED) therapy in pediatric epilepsy patients treated at a single center. MATERIALS AND METHODS We identified 28 children with intractable epilepsy and 213 patients with drug-responsive epilepsy. RESULTS Univariate analysis showed that age at onset, high (daily) initial seizure frequency, infantile spa...

Of all the upsets which can happen to the infant or child, it would be safe to say that none is as alarming to the parents as a convulsion. A good knowledge of the causes of convulsions is therefore essential, if one is to handle the situation well, and relieve the parental anxiety with authority. The diagnosis may sometimes be difficult, for even 'windy pains ' with screaming may simulate a co...

UNLABELLED We performed a longitudinal clinico-electroencephalographic study of 23 children who were diagnosed as having absence epilepsy on their initial visits to our facility and we analysed those factors which lead to an unfavourable prognosis. SUBJECTS AND METHODS We divided the 23 patients into three groups according to their clinical courses: Group A: eight patients who responded well ...

Idiopathic epilepsies in childhood normally appear at well distinct, characteristic ages and normally tend to disappear in most of the cases or to respond well to antiepileptic treatment without impairing the development of the child – this is the reason why they can be considered to have a good prognosis. Nevertheless an active epilepsy is able to take influence on congnitive networks, such as...