[Memory disorders in epileptic patients. A study of pre-postsurgical follow-up]

In general terms, epileptic patients with temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE) show mnesic deficits. In the case of medically intractable epilepsy (around 20%) the neurosurgery intervention is a widely accepted treatment. The cognitive effects of surgery have been reported in last years; they emphasize the mnesic positive changes of contralateral area. In the same sense they have reported a negative change on mnesic modality in ipsilateral area. This paper present a study in which the mnesic deficits of twenty eight pharmaco resistant epileptic patients have been evaluated and followed up. These patients have been submittes to a surgical treatment at the Epilepsy Surgical Unit of the Hospital de La Princesa (Madrid). The assessment pre and postoperative tested six months apart. The most common cognitive deficit affect bimodally to mnesic functions: so in the verbal as in the visospatial modality. This deficit correlated with the years epilepsy. Meanwhile, the following up study indicates that a relevant numbers of these patients show an improvement in the function of the contralateral hemisphere with respect to the area surgically treated. This finding probably is the consequence of seizure free.