[Video-polygraphic-EEG study in the full-term newborn with low birthweight for their gestational age]. / Estudo vídeo-polissonográfico em recém-nascidos de termo pequenos para a idade gestacional.

Video-polygraphic-EEG studies were performed in the first 24 life-hours of 26 healthy full-term newborns without perinatal injuries. The neurological examination and cranial ultrasonography were normal. The newborns were divided into two groups: one, with full-term appropriate--birth weight 11 newborns (control group) and the other with full-term low-birth weight 15 newborns. Thirteen newborns of the second group had video-polygraphic-EEG study abnormalities. The most frequent abnormalities were found in 11 cases, as far as sleep architecture is concerned. Also, when compared with the control group, 8 cases of an excessive amount of startles and 2 cases of low behavior activities were found. The results demonstrate the usefulness of video-polygraphic-EEG study in the full-term newborns with intra-uterine growth retard. This examination was sensitive to detect behavior, sleep architecture and EEG standard differences in the low birth-weight newborns as to the control group.

Considerations of secondary temporalization.

In generalized forms of epileptic seizure disorder, secondary focal involvement of the temporal lobe may gradually develop. Such signs of "secondary temporalization" may manifest themselves in the seizures type (occurrence of complex partial seizures) and in the EEG. Fourteen observations of secondary temporalization are reported: 3 of them in cases of primary generalized epilepsy and 11 in patients with Lennox-Gastaut syndrome. In 9 patients, additional depth implants were carried out in order to detect a primary focal epileptogenic lesion. Secondary temporalization is likely to be caused by independent paroxysmal activity evolving in the limbic structures (amygdala, hippocampus) due to their role of "low threshold areas." Postconvulsive hypoxic damage of the hippocampus is possible but a much less likely cause of secondary temporal lobe manifestations.

Crossover phenomena in epileptic syndromes of childhood.

Benign Rolandic epilepsy (BRE) and primary generalized epilepsy (PGE) are found at about the same period of childhood. Crossover from PGE to BRE and vice versa may occur; two short case reports provide further evidence for this development. Hence, transitions from a primarily generalized to a focal (partial) epileptic seizure disorder and vice versa is a possibility. Both PGE and BRE are based upon states of hyperexcitability, i.e. dysfunctional rather than structural abnormalities that are capable of changing their spatial distribution.