The Turkish Journal of Pediatrics
2013 , Vol 55 , Num 6
Usefulness of long-term video-EEG monitoring in children at a tertiary care center
1Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland, Dublin, Ireland, and 2Division of Pediatric Neurology, Department of Pediatrics,
Hacettepe University Faculty of Medicine, Ankara, Turkey. E-mail: selinonay@rcsi.ie
The value of video-electroencephalographic monitoring (EEG-VM) in
evaluating patients with epileptic disorders constitutes a major research
field. This study investigates the usefulness of inpatient long-term EEG-VM
for pediatric neurology patients under four headings: pre-surgical evaluation;
seizure classification; epileptic seizure and non-epileptic paroxysmal event
differentiation; and antiepileptic drug (AED) treatment modification. A
retrospective study of 101 patients over a one-year period was carried out.
The results showed that following EEG-VM, 57.4% of the patients were
referred for discussion to the epilepsy surgery conference regarding resective
surgery, and of these, 31% were deemed to be surgical candidates. The seizure
classification assigned to the patients before EEG-VM changed in 73.3% of
the patients after EEG-VM. Regarding the differentiation between epileptic
seizure and non-epileptic paroxysmal events, a diagnosis of psychogenic
non-epileptic seizure (PNES) was made in 4% of the patients after EEG-VM.
EEG-VM outcomes led to the modification of AED treatment in 68.3% of the
patients. These significant alterations demonstrate the usefulness of EEG-VM
in the management of pediatric neurology patients.
Keywords :
epilepsy, long-term video-EEG monitoring, children.