Abstracts

Rationale: The etiology and clinical course of epilepsies are very heterogeneous; this has lead to attempts for classification of epilepsies in order to achieve accurate diagnosis and treatment approaches, and determine prognosis. Methods: 320 patients admitted to our video-EEG monitoring unit between August 2005-December 2007, were reviewed retrospectively; 183 patients with ictal recordings, aged between 3 months-18 years (mean 9.5 4,7 years), were studied. Clinical and etiological features were documented. Patients were classified with respect to epileptic seizures and epilepy syndromes based on ILAE 1981 Clinical and Electroencephalographic Classification of Epileptic Seizures, ILAE 1989 classification of epileptic syndromes and Semiyologic Seizure Classification (SSC). Results: According to ILAE 1981 Clinical and Electroencephalographic Classification of Epileptic Seizures, ~82% of our patients were classified as having partial seizures and ~18% were classified as having generalized seizures. Partial seizures were significantly higher in patients who were >12 years, compared to the other age groups (p <0.05). According to SSC, 183 patients had 211 different types of seizures; lateralizing features were observed in half of the patients; 114 (54%) seizures showed semiologic evolution. A total of 373 semiologic subtypes were observed in 211 seizures; majority of them were motor seizures (78%, 291/373). Simple motor semiology (49%, 184/373), and tonic seizures (57.6%, 106/184) were the most common semiologic types. According to ILAE 1989 classification of epileptic syndromes, localization-related epilepsies and syndromes were seen in 80.4% (147/183) of patients and 83% (122/147) had symptomatic epilepsy. Patients with extratemporal lobe epilepsies constituted 54.4% of patients with localization-related epilepsies. Overall malformations of central nervous system (CNS) were seen in 29.5% of patients as the leading etiologic factor.