OBJECTIVE To determine long-term retention, percentage of patients withdrawing because of adverse events, percentage of patients achieving seizure freedom, safety profile of the new anti-epileptic drugs lamotrigine, levetiracetam and topiramate. METHODS All patients treated with lamotrigine, levetiracetam or topiramate in the Epilepsy Centre were identified. Each drug was analyzed from introd...

BACKGROUND This study was designed to investigate the effects of different doses of levetiracetam on aquaporin 4 (AQP4) expression in rats after fluid percussion injury. MATERIAL AND METHODS Sprague-Dawley rats were randomly divided into 4 groups: sham operation group, traumatic brain injury group, low-dose levetiracetam group, and high-dose levetiracetam group. Brain edema models were establis...

OBJECTIVE To obtain descriptive safety and efficacy data for long-term levetiracetam therapy and to allow patients benefiting from add-on levetiracetam to continue treatment until the drug was available commercially. METHODS This long-term, noncomparative, open-label, follow-up study was conducted at 36 US sites. Patients with refractory partial epileptic seizures were eligible if they had be...

Myoclonus in corticobasal degeneration (CBD) has often been associated with severe and difficult to treat disabilities. Levetiracetam is a new antiepileptic agent with antimyoclonic effects. Herein, we present a 72-year-old woman with clinically probable CBD and with spontaneous rhythmic myoclonus in the right foot, which was markedly ameliorated through treatment with levetiracetam. The effect...

OBJECTIVES Levetiracetam is a broad-spectrum antiepileptic drug (AED) which is currently licensed in the United States and the United Kingdom and Ireland for use as adjunctive treatment of focal-onset seizures and myoclonic seizures or generalized tonic-clonic seizures, occurring as part of generalized epilepsy syndromes. In the United Kingdom and Ireland, it is also licensed as monotherapy tre...

Epilepsy is a neurological seizure disorder that affects over 100 million people worldwide. Levetiracetam, either alone, as monotherapy, or as adjunctive treatment, is widely used to control certain types of seizures. Despite its increasing popularity as a relatively safe and effective anti-convulsive treatment option, its mechanism(s) of action are poorly understood. Studies have suggested neu...

AIM Genetic predisposition and some environmental factors play an important role in the development of neural tube defects. Levetiracetam is a new drug that has been approved in the treatment of partial seizures. We aimed in this study to determine the effect of levetiracetam on chick embryos. MATERIAL AND METHODS One hundred and sixty fertile non-pathogenic Super Nick eggs were incubated for...

Granulomatous interstitial nephritis (GIN) is an uncommon cause of renal failure, which may be caused by drugs. Levetiracetam is an increasingly used anti-epileptic medication that is not known to cause renal toxicity in adults. To our knowledge, levetiracetam has not previously been reported as a cause of GIN. We report the case of a 69-year-old woman who developed haemodialysis-requiring acut...

Levetiracetam is an FDA-approved drug used to treat epilepsy and other disorders of the nervous system. Although it is known that levetiracetam binds the synaptic vesicle protein SV2A, how drug binding affects synaptic functioning remains unknown. Here we report that levetiracetam reverses the effects of excess SV2A in autaptic hippocampal neurons. Expression of an SV2A-EGFP fusion protein prod...

BACKGROUND Levetiracetam, a second-generation anti-epileptic drug (AED) with a good efficacy and safety profile, is licensed as monotherapy for adults and children older than 16 years with focal seizures with or without secondary generalization. However, it is increasingly being used off-label in younger children. OBJECTIVES We critically reviewed the available evidence and discuss the presen...