Vomiting as an ictal manifestation of epileptic seizures and syndromes.

Twenty-four out of 900 adult and children patients with epilepsy, were found to have vomiting during an ictus. All the 24 patients were children before puberty with a similar clinical pattern consisting of partial seizures which were mainly nocturnal. Ictal vomiting was always concurrent with other epileptic manifestations, more often deviation of the eyes and impairment of consciousness. The initial part of the ictus was short or prolonged for hours with frequent "marching" to hemi-convulsions and generalised seizures. Seventeen of the 24 children suffered from benign childhood epilepsies (BCE) with complete remission in long follow-up. A significantly higher association was found between ictal vomiting and the syndrome of BCE with occipital spikes (p less than 0.001) but not with centro-temporal spikes (p less than 0.2). The recognition of this association may have important theoretical implications. On clinical grounds, it may prevent unnecessary investigations and undue concern.