Pretreatment electroencephalographic features in patients with childhood absence epilepsy

To analyze the ictal and interictal electroencephalographic (EEG) features in newly diagnosed childhood absence epilepsy (CAE) and determine the association between seizure onset topography, interictal focal spike-wave discharges (FSWDs) and accompanying clinical features of absence seizures.

The authors searched the EEG database for a definite diagnosis of CAE according to ILAE 2017 criteria. Video-EEGs of untreated pediatric patients during sleep and wakefulness were evaluated retrospectively.

The study included 47 patients (25 males, 22 females). Interictal FSWDs were observed in 49% of patients with CAE during wakefulness and in 85.1% during sleep (p = 0.001). Interictal FSWDs were most frequently observed in the frontal regions (awake: 34%; asleep: 74.5%), followed by the posterior temporoparietooccipital region (awake: 21.2%; asleep: 36.1%), and the centrotemporal region (awake: 6.4%; asleep: 8.5%). Eleven patients (23.4%) had polyspikes during sleep. Both bilateral symmetric and asymmetric seizure onset were noted in 32%, whereas focal seizure onset was observed in 14.9% of the patients. Absence seizures with and without motor components were seen in 72.3% and 61.7% of patients, respectively, and in 33% of patients both occurred. There were no associations between the existence of interictal FSWDs, focal/asymmetric seizure onset, and absence seizures with and/or without motor components.

Asymmetric and/or focal seizure onset, interictal FSWDs, and absence seizures with motor components are commonly observed in drug-naive CAE. This study found no association between seizure onset topography, interictal FSWDs, and semiological features of absence seizures.