Executive functioning in children with intractable frontal lobe or temporal lobe epilepsy

Developmental stage affects cognition in children with recently-diagnosed symptomatic focal epilepsy

“…However, this lack of difference may reflect limited power as visual inspection suggests relatively more temporal lobe cases for the group with early-onset epilepsy and a greater proportion of frontal lobe cases for the group with late-onset epilepsy. While this variable would have been explored in a larger sample, other studies found groups with TLE or FLE to be comparable on all but very specific cognitive measures [79,80]. There is no compelling literature to suggest that the number of cases with bilateral spread of seizures significantly impacts the cognitive domains under study, but these issues would benefit from specific attention in future research.…”

Rethinking cognition and behavior in the new classification for childhood epilepsy: Examples from frontal lobe and temporal lobe epilepsies

“…Culhane-Shelburne et al [37] found that children with FLE exhibited difficulties in tasks measuring response inhibition, planning, and problem solving compared with children with TLE, but no differences between these two groups emerged on measures of attention or other aspects of planning and response execution. Another investigation showed that youth with intractable FLE had significantly greater difficulty with concept formation and conceptual shifting compared with children with TLE but that no differences between groups emerged on tasks assessing attention, working memory, rapid mental flexibility, or rapid word retrieval [20]. Despite several of the previously mentioned studies failing to find differences on attentional tasks between children with FLE and TLE, one other study did document differential effects.…”

“…These findings are also consistent with those of Sinclair, et al [19] who demonstrated that children with FLE scored below average on tests of fine motor coordination, visual-spatial planning, and organizational skills and, on parental ratings of behavior, showed greater than normative problems with attention. Longo et al [20] showed that children with FLE had deficits in working memory, mental flexibility, and problem solving. Prevost and colleagues [21] found that a significant proportion of children with nonlesional FLE exhibited attention-deficit disorder with hyperactivity or impulsivity.…”

Assessment of executive functioning in children and young adults treated for frontal lobe tumours using ecologically valid tests

“…The WMI was below average for the group, and was negatively influenced by the left lateralisation of the lesion. The WMI is also very often impaired in childhood ABI, such as TBI (Johansson & Tornmalm, 2012) and brain tumours (Howarth et al, 2013), as well as in epilepsy (Longo, Kerr, & Smith, 2013). It is often more severely impaired than other indices of intellectual functioning, such as VCI and PRI.…”