Initiation of treatment and selection of antiepileptic drugs in childhood epilepsy.

PURPOSE: A retrospective study was carried out on 53 cases with childhood epilepsy to evaluate the validity of the initial selection of antiepileptic drug (AED).

METHODS

We investigated the AEDs selected at the beginning of the treatment from the medical records of 53 untreated cases. A follow-up study was undertaken to evaluate the effects of the AEDs. In the second study, we investigated the AEDs of 10 cases with atypical benign partial epilepsy (ABPE), to clarify whether the initial AEDs selected for rolandic epilepsy were related to the appearance of ABPE.

RESULTS

The AEDs used at the initial stage consisted of carbamazepine (CBZ), valproic acid (VPA), phenobarbital (PB), and vitamin B6. The main AEDs were CBZ and VPA for localization-related epilepsy, and VPA for generalized epilepsy. The initial selection of AEDs in 41 (85.4%) of 48 cases treated with AEDs were considered to be correct from the results of follow-up. We could not specify any AEDs that related to the appearance of ABPE.

CONCLUSIONS

The selection of AED in this series was considered to be most appropriate. We proposed a criterion to determine whether to begin the AED treatment immediately at the initial seizure.