Catamenial epilepsy (CE) is characterized by epileptic seizures in the female occurring rhythmatically with the menstrual cycle. Hormonal mechanisms have been proposed as a cause of this epileptic form. Few reports about the efficacy of anti-epileptic drugs (AEDs) have been published. We studied prospectively women with CE who were treated with lamotrigine (LTG) for a period of 3 months in orde...

Background Seizures are a considerable complication in critically ill patients. Their incidence is significantly high in neurosciences intensive care unit patients. Seizure prophylaxis with anti-epileptic drugs is a common practice in neurosciences intensive care unit. However, its utility in patients without clinical seizure, with an underlying neurological injury, is somewhat controversial. ...

The bone mineral content (B.M.C.) in both forearms (related to total body calcium) was measured by photon absorptiometry for a controlled therapeutic trial in a representative sample of epileptic outpatients, comprising 226 patients treated with one or two major anticonvulsant drugs (phenytoin, phenobarbitone, primidone).Initially the mean B.M.C. value for all epileptic patients was 87% of norm...

Context: Recently, new anti-epileptic drugs are marketed to be used as an add-on to the traditional drugs in children with refractory epilepsy. Levetiracetam is a second-generation of new anti-epileptic drugs with unknown precise mechanism of action in brain and synaptic vesicle in children with drug resistant epilepsy. Herein, the efficacy and safety of add-on levetiracetam in children with re...

In recent years, the functional disturbances of the immune system, both humoral and cell-mediated immunity, have been detected more often among persons with epilepsy than in general population. A number of irregularities in cytokine production have been found in epileptic patients. It shows that epileptic seizures stimulate, per se, synthesis of pro-inflammatory and pro-convulsive cytokines. So...

OBJECTIVE Chronic type skin reactions are defined as unwanted effects of drugs. As there are more benign conditions, skin findings related to chronic usage of anti-epileptic drugs (AEDs) have not been studied previously. In this study, we investigate the skin findings associated with the chronic usage of AEDs. METHODS The study was conducted in the Post, Telephone and Telegraph Training and R...

The clinical and economic consequences of generic antiepileptic drug (AED) substitution are not yet fully understood. Generic substitution may increase pharmacy utilization, but it may not always save health care costs for AEDs. The AEDs are relatively cheap, but high volumes of prescriptions mean that substantial drug-budget savings may be possible by switching from innovator brands to cheaper...

PURPOSE Older enzyme-inducing antiepileptic drugs (AEDs) may induce supraphysiologic plasma concentrations of total (t) homocysteine (Hcy). The aim of the present study was to investigate the effect of new AEDs on plasma tHcy levels. METHODS Patients 18-50 years of age, on AEDs monotherapy, with no other known cause of hyper-tHcy were enrolled. Plasma tHcy, folate, vitamin B(12), and AEDs lev...

Wolf-Hirschhorn syndrome (WHS) is a chromosome disorder (4p-syndrome) which is characterized by craniofacial features and epileptic seizures. Here, we report a case of WHS with West syndrome, in whom the seizures were refractory to several antiepileptic drugs but were responsive to the addition of lamotrigine. The patient had epileptic spasms at age seven months. The interictal electroencephalo...

Epilepsy is a complex disease that evolves throughout patients’ lives. For many, seizure management requires escalation from single-drug therapy to multi-drug therapy, adjuvant placement of a vagal nerve stimulation (VNS), and ultimately surgical resection or laser-ablation of the epileptic focus [1]. However, if the seizure focus lies within a region of movement or speech eloquence, lesioning ...