10-year outcome of childhood epilepsy in well-functioning children and adolescents.

BACKGROUND

A population based study of epilepsy in children from a Swedish county including all children aged 1 month to 16 years was reported in 2006.

AIM

To describe the medical outcome, seizure types, epilepsy syndromes, treatment, individual and family history in children from this study who were well-functioning in January 1997 and the outcome after 10 years.

METHODS

Forty-five individuals, 11-21 years, 19 females, and their parents responded to a questionnaire and the hospital records were reviewed.

RESULTS

At the end of the 10-year period 75.6% of the patients were in remission. Focal seizures and focal seizures with secondary generalization were found in 57.8%. Rolandic epilepsy had been diagnosed in 33.3%, other idiopathic focal epilepsies in 11.0%, cryptogenic and symptomatic focal epilepsies in 22.2%, childhood absence epilepsy in 8.9%, juvenile absence epilepsy and Jeavons syndrome in each 2.2%, West syndrome in 4.4%, and other "generalized" epilepsies in 15.5%. The patients had a history of simple febrile seizures in 15.6% and of primary headache in 24.4%. Monotherapy with antiepileptic drugs was used by 64.4%, and valproate was the most common first drug of choice. A family history of epilepsy was found in 44.4%, febrile seizures in 17.7%, and primary headache in 57.8%. A coincidence of focal and generalized epilepsy phenotypes was found in some families.

CONCLUSIONS

Longitudinal studies are of importance in epilepsy epidemiology. Our results reflect the selection of only well-functioning individuals with epilepsy from the population based original study.