Neonatal hypoglycemic brain - injury a common cause of infantile onset remote symptomatic epilepsy

To study the etiology of remote symptomatic epilepsy with onset in the first 3 years of life. Patients with neonatal hypoglycemic brain injury (NHBI), were further studied for risk factors and clinical features.

The study was conducted at a tertiary pediatric neurology service between May-August 2004. Consecutive patients were recruited prospectively. The probable etiological diagnoses were based primarily on cranial imaging. Two radiologists, blinded to the etiological diagnosis, reviewed the cranial imaging and suggested the likely etiology based on published imaging criteria. There were three categories i.e, (i) perinatal encephaloclastic conditions (PEC) e.g., hypoxic ischemic encephalopathy (HIE) etc, (ii) developmental (DV) e.g., tuberous sclerosis, etc and (iii) postnatal (PN) e.g., trauma, etc. Three risk factors (birth weight, type of delivery, feeding difficulty) were compared between NHBI and developmental etiology (DV) groups. Neurological findings were compared between the NHBI vs the other perinatal groups. Seizure details were studied only in the NHBI group.

63 boys and 37 girls were recruited. Mean age of seizure onset was 13.9 months. PEC were seen in 50 patients, DV in 28 patients and PN in 5. NHBI was seen in 23 patients and was the most frequent cause of epilepsy. Low birth weight (LBW), neonatal feeding difficulties and cesarean delivery were significant risk factors for NHBI vis a vis the DV group. Microcephaly, autism, visual impairment and apraxia of hand use were common while spasticity or dystronia were rare in NHBI. Spasms were the commonest seizure type.

Neonatal hypoglycemia is the most common etiology of remote symptomatic infantile onset epilepsy. LBW, poor neonatal feeding and cesarean delivery are significant clinical correlates.