Haddad Naim, Melikyan Gayane, Al Hail Hassan, Al Jurdi Ayman, Aqeel Faten, Elzafarany Abdullah, Abuhadra Nour, Laswi Mujahed, Alsamman Yasser, Uthman Basim, Deleu Dirk, Mesraoua Boulenouar, Alarcon Gonzalo, Azar Nabil, Streletz Leopold, Mahfoud Ziyad
Weill Cornell Medicine-Qatar, PO Box 24144, Education City, Doha, Qatar; Hamad Medical Corporation, PO Box 3050, Doha, Qatar.
Weill Cornell Medicine-Qatar, PO Box 24144, Education City, Doha, Qatar.
Epilepsy Behav. 2016 Oct;63:98-102. doi: 10.1016/j.yebeh.2016.07.043. Epub 2016 Aug 30.
Qatar is a small country on the Eastern coast of the Arabian Peninsula. Its population is a unique mixture of native citizens and immigrants. We aimed to describe the features of epilepsy in Qatar as such information is virtually lacking from the current literature.
We summarized information retrospectively collected from 468 patients with epilepsy seen through the national health system adult neurology clinic.
Epilepsy was classified as focal in 65.5% of the cases and generalized in 23%. Common causes of epilepsy were as follows: stroke (9%), hippocampal sclerosis (7%), infections (6%), and trauma (6%). Sixty-six percent of patients were receiving a single antiepileptic drug, with levetiracetam being the most frequently prescribed drug (41% of subjects). When the patients were divided by geographical background, remote infections caused the epilepsy in 15% of Asian patients (with neurocysticercosis accounting for 10%) but only in 1% of Qatari and 3% of Middle East/North African subjects (with no reported neurocysticercosis) (p<0.001). Cerebrovascular and neurodegenerative etiologies were the most prominent in Qataris, accounting for 14% (p=0.005) and 4% (p=0.03) of cases, respectively. The choice of antiepileptic drugs varied also according to the regional background, but the seizure freedom rate did not, averaging at 54% on the last clinic visit.
To our knowledge, this is the first detailed information about epilepsy in Qatar. The geographical origin of patients adds to the heterogeneity of this disorder. Neurocysticercosis should be in the etiological differential diagnosis of epilepsy in patients coming from Southeast Asian countries, despite the fact that it is not endemic to Qatar. The choice of antiepileptic drugs is influenced by the availability of individual agents in the patients' native countries but had no bearing on the final seizure outcome.
卡塔尔是阿拉伯半岛东海岸的一个小国。其人口是本国公民和移民的独特混合体。由于现有文献中几乎没有此类信息，我们旨在描述卡塔尔癫痫的特征。
我们回顾性总结了通过国家卫生系统成人神经科门诊诊治的468例癫痫患者的信息。
癫痫病例中65.5%被分类为局灶性癫痫，23%为全身性癫痫。癫痫的常见病因如下：中风（9%）、海马硬化（7%）、感染（6%）和创伤（6%）。66%的患者正在服用单一抗癫痫药物，左乙拉西坦是最常处方的药物（占受试者的41%）。当按地理背景对患者进行划分时，15%的亚洲患者的癫痫由远距离感染引起（其中神经囊尾蚴病占10%），但卡塔尔患者中这一比例仅为1%，中东/北非受试者中为3%（无神经囊尾蚴病报告）（p<0.001）。脑血管和神经退行性病因在卡塔尔人中最为突出，分别占病例的14%（p=0.005）和4%（p=0.03）。抗癫痫药物的选择也因地区背景而异，但癫痫发作缓解率并无差异，上次门诊就诊时平均缓解率为54%。
据我们所知，这是关于卡塔尔癫痫的首个详细信息。患者的地理来源增加了这种疾病的异质性。尽管卡塔尔并非神经囊尾蚴病的流行地区，但在来自东南亚国家的癫痫患者的病因鉴别诊断中应考虑神经囊尾蚴病。抗癫痫药物的选择受患者本国可用药物的影响，但对最终癫痫发作结果并无影响。
