Postictal language dysfunction in complex partial seizures: effect of contralateral ictal spread

The authors report postictal language evaluation in patients monitored with bitemporal depth electrodes. Patients whose seizures began in the nondominant temporal lobe and propagated to the contralateral temporal lobe had a prolonged postictal language delay (PILD) with paraphasic errors compared with seizures that did not spread. Shorter propagation time was also associated with a longer PILD. Our study suggests that ictal involvement of the dominant temporal lobe is important in postictal language behavior.