Objectives To investigate the effects of new antiepileptic drugs [oxcarbazepine (OXC), levetiracetam (LEV), lamotrigine (LTG)] on thyroid hormones in male adults with epilepsy. Methods Thirty-eight newly diagnosed male adult patients with epilepsy were enrolled in the Epilepsy Center of Sichuan Province People's Hospital from April 2015 to November 2016. The diagnosis was in line with the classification of epilepsy defined by the International League Against Epilepsy (ILAE, 1981). Only patients with generalized or secondary generalized epilepsy were recruited into the present study. Individual treatment with OXC, LEV, or LTG was randomly assigned to the 38 patients. Thyroid hormones was measured before treatment and 6 months after taking the medicine. Followed by an analysis of the comparison between the treated patients and healthy volunteers (healthy controls) as well as the changes and differences between the patients themselves before and after treatment. Results There was no significant difference in the thyroid hormone levels between male patients with epilepsy before taking the medicine and healthy controls (P>0.05). After 6 months, total thyroxine (TT4) and free thyroxine (FT4) in OXC group was significantly lower than the baseline (P<0.05). However, the thyroid hormone levels in the LEV group and LTG group showed no statistical difference before and after treatment (P>0.05). Conclusions OXC can reduce serum total thyroxine (TT4) and free thyroxine (FT4), which might be harmful to thyroid hormone of patients.
Objective To investigate the changes of cognitive function of epileptic patients after antiepileptic drugs (AEDs) therapy. Methods Twenty eight cases of epileptic patients with new diagnosis and untreatment from March 2015 to February 2016 were collected. According to the seizure type, degree of attack and drug efficacy, patients were divided into three groups and treated with one of three AEDs, including Lamotrigine (LTG), Oxcarbazepine (OXC), and Sodium valproate (VPA). Among them, 11 were LTG group, 12 were OXC group and 5 were VPA group.Then the patients were followed up for 1 year. The clinical memory scale was used to analyze cognitive function of epileptic patients before and after therapy. Results Compared to 30 cases of healthy volunteers, the scores of memory quotient (P<0.01), directed memory (P<0.05), associative learning (P<0.05) and image free recall (P<0.01) of epileptic patients were obviously decreased before AEDs therapy.AEDs therapy reduced or controlled seizures in new diagnostic epileptic patients, and the total effective rate was 85.7%. In the clinical memory scale tests, the scores of memory quotient (P<0.01), directed memory (P<0.05), associative learning (P<0.05), portrait characteristics contact memory (P<0.05) were improved after therapy. The scores of image free recall and meaningless graphics recognition were also improved, but there was no statistical significance. Besides, there was a statistically significant improvement in the score of portrait characteristics contact memory after LTG treatment (P<0.05), and directed memory after VPA treatment (P<0.05). Conclusions Epileptic patients accompanied with cognitive deficits before drug intervention. Through standard AEDs treatment, seizures could be better controlled. The cognitive function of epileptic patients was not declined after short-term（within 1 year） intervention of LTG, OCX or VPA. Moreover some parts of the cognitive domain could be improved.
PurposeTo analyze the effect of medication withdraw (MW) on long-term electroencephalogram (EEG) monitoring in children who need preoperative assessment for refractory epilepsy.MethodsRetrospective analysis was performed on the data of preoperative long-term EEG monitoring of children with refractory epilepsy who needed preoperative evaluation in the Pediatric Epilepsy Center of Peking University First Hospital from August 2018 to December 2019. Monitoring duration: at least three habitual seizures were detected, or the monitoring duration were as long as 10 days. MW protocol was according to the established plan.ResultsA total of 576 children (median age 4.4 years) required presurgical ictal EEGs, and 75 (75/576, 13.0%) needed MW for ictal EEGs. Among the 75 cases, 38 were male and 37 were female. The age range was from 15 months to 17 years (median age: 7.0 years). EEG and clinical data of with 65 children who strictly obey the MW protocol were analyzed. The total monitoring duration range was from 44.1 h (about 2 days) to 241.8 h (about 10 days)(median: 118.9 h (about 5 days)). Interictal EEG features before MW were including focal interictal epileptiform discharge (IED) in 39 cases (39/65, 60%), focal and generalized IED in 2 cases (2/65, 3.1%), multifocal IED in 20 cases (20/65, 30.7%), multifocal and generalized IED in 2 cases (2/65, 3.1%), and no IED in 2 cases (2/65, 3.1%). After MW, 18 cases (18/65, 27.7%) had no change in IED and the other 47 cases had changes of IED after MW. And IEDs in 46 cases (46/65, 70.8%) were aggravated, and IED was decreased in 1 case. The pattern of aggravated IED was original IED increasement, in 41 cases (41/46, 89.1%), and 5 cases (5 /46, 10.9%) had generalized IED which was not detected before MW. Of the 46 patients with IED exacerbations, 87.3% appeared within 3 days after MW. Habitual seizures were detected in 56 cases (86.2%, 56/65) after MW, and within 3 days of MW in 80.4% cases. Eight patients (14.3%) had secondary bilateral-tonic seizure (BTCS), of which only 1 patient had no BTCS in his habitual seizures. In 56 cases, 94.6% (53/56) had seizures after MW of two kinds of AEDs.Conclusions① In this group, thirteen percent children with intractable epilepsy needed MW to obtain ictal EEG; ② Most of them (86.2%) could obtain ictal EEG by MW. The IED and ictal EEG after MW were still helpful for localization of epileptogenic zone; ③ Most of the patients can obtain ictal EEG within 3 days after MW or after MW of two kinds of AEDs;4. The new secondary generalization was extremely rare.
Objective To investigate the effects of antiepileptic drugs (AEDs) with warfarin functions and blood coagulation system, to provide the reference for clinicians of the selection of AEDs under the combination therapy with warfarin. Methods Analyse the clinical data of the patient with symptomatic epilepsy from the Second Clinical Medical College of Guiyang University of Chinese Medicine on April 1, 2017, whom taking AEDs and warfarin at the same time, clear the drug adverse reactions, and analysed related literature. Results After the treatment with valproate, abnormal blood coagulation, a danger and emergency data appeared, so we stopped using warfarin immediately, and reduce the dosage of valproate gradually, insteadly, we used levetiracetam as antiepileptic therapy. Monitoring blood coagulation function, when it returned to normal, restart warfarin anticoagulant therapy. Conclusions When start antiepileptic treatment in relevant basic diseases of symptomatic epilepsy, for a variety of combination reactions, AEDs can affect the anticoagulant effect of warfarin, so we need to consider the interaction between drugs and avoid adverse reactions.