Pregnancy outcomes in women with surgically treated epilepsy.

OBJECTIVE

To ascertain whether epileptic seizure control during pregnancy differed between Australian women with previously surgically treated epilepsy, and those with only medically treated epilepsy.

MATERIALS/

METHODS

Analysis of data for 74 pregnancies of women with surgically treated focal epilepsy, compared with that from 1013 pregnancies in women with medically treated focal epilepsy, both groups drawn from the Australian Register of Antiepileptic Drugs in Pregnancy between 1999 and 2020.

RESULTS

Seizures of all types, and also convulsive seizures, were less well controlled during pregnancy in the previously surgically treated cases, the difference for seizures of all types (68.9% versus 50.1%) being statistically significant (p < .05). This result was contrary to the outcome of a previously published study of the same question carried out in India.

CONCLUSIONS

At present, it may be premature to conclude that previous epilepsy surgery will be associated with a better chance of seizure-free, or seizure-controlled, pregnancy.