Interictal brain SPECT in patients with medically refractory temporal lobe epilepsy

Abstract

A cross-sectional epidemiological study was done among a general population in a big hospital in São Paulo, Brazil. From an initial population of 1781 nursing personnel, 407 were called for a semi-structured interview based on a standard questionnaire. The average age of the interviewed population was 32.6 + 9.2 years old and 89.4% were female. Making use of the criteria of the International Headache Society, prevalence of migraine was detected in 53.1% of them (22.1% migraine without aura; 7,9% migraine with aura; 9.2% migraine with and without aura; 13.8% migrainous disorder not fulfilling criteria) The clinical criterion most related to the diagnosis of migrainous disorder was the shortest duration of the migraine crises. The high patterns of prevalence were due to populational factors (mostly female people, age, and professional activity linked to service occupation) and to factors linked to the diagnostical characterization of the type of headaches. The independent variables most related to diagnosis of migraine were family history, high levels in Epworth Sleepiness Scale and subjective perception of stress. Other variables were: gender, physical activity, exposition to vapours and type of professional activity. Half of the population who suffered headache had already looked for medical support, and only 28.6% of doctors got to adequate diagnoses. Once the social importance of the prevalence of migraine among this populational group, populational impact measures are proposed.

A Neurofunctional Evaluation Strategy for Presurgical Selection of Temporal Lobe Epilepsy Patients

“…There is evidence that the dysfunction may be several times greater than the observed structural defect. [39,40] This suggests that, in addition to anatomical abnormalities, a process of neuronal inhibition occurs during the interictal phase that translates into perfusion and metabolic dysfunction. We reported a higher coincidence than that reported by other authors, due, we believe, to a semi-quantitative analysis of brain perfusion in the regions evaluated.…”