A longitudinal study of psychological features in patients before and two years after epilepsy surgery

This study aimed at investigating psychological features before and two years after epilepsy surgery. Fifty patients, 39 with temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE) and 11 with frontal lobe epilepsy (FLE), were assessed at baseline and two years postoperatively with the Karolinska Scales of Personality (KSP). Baseline group level outcome was normal while individual level analyses delineated some mild to moderate degrees of psychological problems exceeding the normal range in subsets of patients. Features of hostility characterized half of the FLE and one-fourth of the TLE patients. Above 1/3 in each group had dependency features. About 1/3 of the TLE patients suffered from psychasthenia. In conclusion, even though group levels were normal, several patients had psychological problems. The main longitudinal result was that the personality features were stable and did not change after epilepsy surgery.