Role of interictal epileptiform discharge in reducing recurrent epilepsy after withdrawal of antiepileptic drugs / 中华老年心脑血管病杂志

ABSTRACT

Objective To study the role of interictal epileptiform discharge (IED) in reducing recurrent epilepsy after withdrawal of antiepileptic drugs (AED).Methods One hundred epilepsy pa tients with no seizure for ≥2 years were divided into IED group (n=51) and IED free group (n=49) according to the classification of epilepsy seizure developed by the International Association for the Prevention of Epilepsy in 1981.The patients were further divided into elderly group (n=21) and non-elderly group (n=79) and were followed up for at least 1 year by return visit or telephone.Results No significant difference was found in the incidence of IED in the 100 epilepsy patients with different types of seizure,such as myospasm,simple partial seizure and ≥2 seizures.However,the incidence of IED was significantly higher than that of myotonia,myospasm,absence and simple partial seizure (P＜0.05).Epilepsy recurred in 37 patients (72.5％) of IED group and in 16 patients (32.7％) of IED-free group.Logistic regression analysis showed that the course of epilepsy and IED were the risk factors for recurrent epilepsy after withdrawal of AED (OR=1.165,95％CI1.022-1.329,P=0.022;OR=2.794,95％CI1.040-7.509,P=0.042) and the course of epilepsy was longer in elderly group than in non-elderly group (10.10±7.55 years vs 5.97±4.04 years,P=0.001).Conclusion The seizure type and course of epilepsy are the relia ble predictors of recurrent epilepsy in patients with no seizure for a long time after withdrawal of AED,and are thus of clinical significance.