Epilepsy-aphasia syndrome in children: an unusual presentation to psychiatry

This paper describes the psychiatric and clinical manifestations of the epilepsy-aphasia syndrome which occurs in children. In 1957, Landau and Kleffner reported the development of receptive and expressive aphasia at 5 to 6 years of age, in six children with normal language development at that time. Since this first report, further accounts of acquired language disabilities associated with EEG abnormalities have appeared. However, the clinical syndrome remains ill defined and its pathophysiology is poorly understood. There are no reported cases of this syndrome presenting initially to psychiatry. This paper reports a child who presented to psychiatry with severe aggression associated with the clinical syndrome of epilepsy-aphasia. The discussion examines the relationships between the aggressive behavior and the EEG findings and aphasia.