[Neonatal seizures, our experience]

To study retrospectively all newborns admitted between 1992 and 1998 in our Neonatology Unit with convulsions before 30 days of life.

77 patients, 63.6% male, with an average gestational age of 36.42 weeks, and an average birth weight of 2,653 g. Apgar score at five minutes was below 4 in 4 newborns.

In 35 patients the first convulsion occurred in the first 48 hours of life, 7 patients showed status epilepticus. There was a single type of seizure in 49 newborns (65.3%), specially tonic and clonic (multifocal and focal). Head ultrasound was abnormal in 33 newborn, CT scan and/or MRI abnormal in 24, EEG was pathologic in 55. Phenobarbital was the initial treatment in 81.8%, half of them required a therapeutical change. 34 patients (55.7%) still received treatment at hospital discharge. The etiology was hypoxic ischaemic encephalopathy (39%), though less important than in previous studies, intracranial hemorrhage (13%), central nervous system malformations (9%), among other. 16 patients died, 35 showed an abnormal outcome (45.4%): cognitive delay in 24, epilepsy in 19, motor abnormalities in 12.

The worst outcome was found in malformations, meningitis, intracranial hemorrhages, metabolic diseases and hypoxic ischaemic encephalopathy, while the best in hypoglycemia and in benign idiopathic neonatal seizures.