Partial Epilepsy & Quality of Life
The Journal of Neurology recently published the findings of investigators from specialist departments in The Netherlands who tested 56 outpatients with relatively well controlled partial epilepsy without symptomatic etiology to assess attention, memory, information processing and executive functioning.
A group of 29 males and 27 females taking carbamazepine (mean age 41.3 years) was compared with a control group of 56 healthy people matched for age, gender and education. Objective and subjective cognitive deficits were examined, and the influence of the epilepsy history and drug therapies on various cognitive functions and cognition and "health-related quality of life" (HRQOL) were assessed. Self perceived functioning (CFQ) and HRQOL (SF-36) were measured by questionnaire and the 2 groups were compared using Mann Whitney-U tests. Epilepsy and medication-related factors associated with cognitive functioning and HRQOL were identified by linear regression analysis.
Lower scores were found in the patient group in measurements of attention, learning and speed of information processing. While physical functioning was unaffected, mental aspects of HRQOL, such as fatigue, were lower. Overall results confirmed that cognitive functioning and HRQOL were not attributed to age at onset, duration of epilepsy, seizure type or frequency, localization or number of years taking and dosage of carbazmazepine.
Physicians should watch for patients with partial epilepsy whose impaired cognition and health-related quality of life (HRQOL) are unrelated to their epilepsy history or dosage of carbamazepine monotherapy.
Source
Journal of Neurology, Vol 249, Issue 3 (2002); 294-299. "Cognition and health-related quality of life in a well-defined subgroup of patients with partial epilepsy"
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