Psychogenic non-epileptic seizures (PNES) - time-limited disturbances of consciousness and motor-sensory control, not accompanied by ictal activity on electroencephalogram (EEG) - are best conceptualized as atypical neurophysiological responses to emotional distress, physiological stressors and danger. Patients and families find the diagnosis of PNES difficult to understand; the transition from...

Psychogenic non-epileptic seizure (PNES), also known as pseudoseizure, pseudo-epileptic seizure and psychogenic seizure, is a psychologically based disorder accompanied with abnormal movements, sensations, emotions and/or behaviors that mimic epileptic seizures, but does not originate from a neurological disturbance (1-3). Psychogenic seizure, historically known as hysterical seizure (3, 4), is...

PURPOSE To determine whether patients with comorbid epilepsy and psychogenic nonepileptic seizure (PNES) and their caregivers can distinguish between these two events at least one year after initial diagnosis, and to investigate factors associated with correct identification. METHODS Adult patients with at least a one year diagnosis of both epilepsy and PNES, confirmed through video-electroen...

We compared MMPI-2 profiles of Gulf War veterans with fibromyalgia (FM) to epileptic seizure (ES) patients, psychogenic non-epileptic seizure (PNES) patients, and Gulf War veteran healthy controls. Both PNES and FM are medically unexplained conditions. In previous MMPI-2 research PNES patients were shown to have significantly higher Hs and Hy clinical scales than ES patients. In the present res...

INTRODUCTION Psychogenic Non Epileptic Seizures (PNES) have been theorized to reflect a learned pattern of avoidant behavior to deal with stressors. Although such observation may be relevant for our understanding of the etiology of PNES, evidence for this theory is largely build on self-report investigations and no studies have systematically tested actual avoidance behavior in patients with PN...

PURPOSE Our purpose was to investigate psychological problems and clinical outcomes in children with psychogenic non-epileptic seizures (PNES). MATERIALS AND METHODS We retrospectively reviewed the data of 25 patients who were diagnosed with PNES between 2006 and 2012. RESULTS Twenty-five children with PNES, aged 8 to 19 years (mean 13.82), were referred to psychiatrists for psychiatric ass...

PURPOSE This qualitative study aimed at examining the subjective experiences of patients during the complicated and often prolonged diagnostic process of psychogenic non-epileptic seizures (PNES). METHODS Thematic analyses were used to explore the semi-structured interviews that were conducted with ten individuals who have been diagnosed with PNES. RESULTS Six main themes, namely inexpert h...

Psychogenic nonepileptic seizures (PNES) are an uncomfortable topic, one which is difficult for both patients and healthcare professionals to discuss as well as treat, and yet it is estimated that PNES are diagnosed in 20 to 30% of patients seen at epilepsy centers for intractable seizures.1 Moreover, in the general population the prevalence rate is 2-33 per 100, 000, making PNES nearly as prev...

PURPOSE To extend our previous research demonstrating that linguistic/interactional features in patients' talk can assist the challenging differential diagnosis of epilepsy and psychogenic nonepileptic seizures (PNES) by exploring the differential diagnostic potential of references to non co-present persons (third parties). METHOD Initial encounters were recorded between 20 seizure patients (...