[Neonatal seizures: the beginning and interruption of the treatment]. / Convulsiones neonatales: inicio e interrupción del tratamiento.

Opinions vary as to which 'neonatal seizures' should be treated and which should not be. There is also controversy as to when therapy of seizures should be discontinued. A poll taken among a group of eleven experts in these matters concurred in the opinion that classical neonatal seizures, those well established by clinical and EEG criteria, can be treated before confirmatory EEG support is obtained. They also agreed that those movements known as subtle seizures should await EEG or video/EEG confirmation before commencing therapy. Nine of these experts now believe that therapy for seizures should be terminated at an early time. Most will stop the therapy while the patient is still in the nursery with the exception of 3 who would treat the babies for 3 months.

The phenotype of the X-linked dystonia-parkinsonism syndrome. An assessment of 42 cases in the Philippines.

The clinical phenotype of X-linked recessive torsion dystonia was documented in 42 affected individuals from 21 families. In 7 families, there were 9 sibships (core families) with 2 or more affected individuals available for evaluation. The ages of the patients ranged from 29 to 79 years with a mean of 46.2 +/- 10.1 years; the mean age of onset of dystonia was 35.0 +/- 8.0 years with a range of 12 to 48 years; and the mean duration of illness was 11.1 +/- 7.9 years. First manifestations were noted in the lower extremities in 36%, the axial musculature in 29%, the upper extremities in 23%, and in the head in 12% of the cases. The majority of patients displayed gait abnormalities (90%), leg dystonia (79%), oromandibular dystonia (64%), neck dystonia (57%), blepharospasm (57%), and truncal dystonia (52%). The disease generalized in 90% of the cases within 1 to 11 years of onset (median duration, 5 years). Overall, the condition was disabling, but the Fahn-Marsden disability score did not correlate with age of onset, duration of illness, site of onset, rate of generalization, or presence of parkinsonism. Thirty-six percent of the cases displayed at least 1 of the following "parkinsonian symptoms": bradykinesia, tremor, rigidity, loss of postural reflexes and a shuffling gait. Parkinsonism was diagnosed as definite in 14%, probable in 2%, and possible in 19% of the cases. Given this high association of dystonia and parkinsonism, we propose to call the disorder X-linked dystonia-parkinsonism syndrome (XDP).(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)