A clinical follow-up of cognition in epileptic children medicated with monotherapy

Objective To examine the effect of factors especially the effects of conventional AEDs (phenobarbital, carbamazepine and valproate) on cognitive function of epileptic children Methods A 6 12 month follow up research on aspects in cognitive function of 38 epileptic children with monotherapy and 15 normal children was done Results The epileptic children had poor VIQ, poor short term memory and slow reactive speed as compared to control subjects [verbal IQ 106±11 vs 112±7; short term visual memory 12 3±4 2 vs 14 9±3 8; odd ball reactive time (492±75)ms vs (443±55)ms, Chinese discriminate(615±99)ms vs (558±70)ms, P 0 05] Cognitive functions of epileptic children were affected by multifactors: ①Age was a factor affecting a variety of aspects of cognition in epileptic children and controls ②Type of AEDs was also a factor affecting cognitive functions including short term memory, VIQ and attention However, blood concentration of drug and duration of medication were not affecting factors ③Duration of illness, seizure type, duration of seizure, status epilepticus affected many items including short term memory, concentration , reactive speed and motor speed of hand Different factors affected on different aspects of cognition Children with controlled clinical seizures developed similar cognitive aspects with controls except to that of Chinese architecture discrimination ERP P3 latency (the difference between two tests was(5 17±30 95)ms in epileptic group, and (-13 04±1 91)ms in control group, P 0 05) Conclusion The level of cognition and development of epileptic children were affected by many factors including AEDs Children with controlled clinical seizures by AEDs had similar developing cognitive function with controls