Does levetiracetam use affect visual evoked potentials in the treatment of childhood epilepsy?

Side effects of antiepileptic drugs vary depending on the drug itself, drug dose and duration of use. One of these side effects is related to vision.

Patients who had been ordered visual evoked potential (VEP) measurements for various reasons between October 1^st, 2017 and October 1^st, 2019 at a pediatric neurology outpatient clinic and who were on levetiracetam monotherapy for at least six months for the treatment of focal/generalized epilepsy were included in the study and their files were scanned retrospectively (study group: SG). Patient files were evaluated for age, gender, dose and duration of levetiracetam use, presence of a family history of epilepsy, EEG result, cranial magnetic resonance imaging and VEP test results and the parameters were recorded. Twenty-four patients of similar age range without epilepsy were included in the study as the control group (CG).

Eighteen patients 8 boys (44.4%), 10 girls (55.6%) and 24 healthy controls 9 boys (37.5%), 15 girls (62.5%) were included in the study and control groups, respectively. No statistically significant difference was found when the mean VEP latencies were compared between the patient and control groups for the right (P=0.451) and left (P=0.323) eyes. There was a statistically significant difference between the groups, respectively, when VEP amplitudes of the right and left eyes of the SG and CG were compared (P=0.001; P=0.001). There is no correlation between levetiracetam dose and duration of treatment and VEP parameters.

The data obtained in this study showed that levetiracetam use affected VEP amplitude outcome but did not affect VEP latency outcome in pediatric patients.