Cognitive analysis before and after surgery in spanish-speaking temporal lobe epilepsy patients.

SOLÍS P; ODDO S,; CONSALVO D; SILVA W; GIAGANTE B; PAPAYANNIS C; D´ALESSIO L

Paris

Congreso; European Epilepsy Congress; 2005

ILAE

The aim of this study is to analyze neuropsychological evaluation results in temporal lobe refractory epilepsy patients, before and after anterior temporal lobectomy. Material and Methods: We selected 35 patients (p.) with refractory temporal lobe epilepsy. All patients were evaluated with a Neuropsychological Protocol that includes the assessment of intelligence, attention, handedness, verbal memory, visual memory, language and executive function. A z-score were applied to raw values for each patient. These results were compared with normal population. According to this, patients were classified as “normal” when tests results presented values above z-2. We also compared raw values for each test, before surgery, 6 months, and one year after surgery.      Results: We have 17 p. with  left anterior temporal lobectomy (LATL) and 18 patients with right anterior temporal lobectomy (RATL). From the total population evaluated, 83% have memory deficits. From the analysis of test raw values, we found after surgery, p. with visual memory deficits (delay recall) (p=0.03), executive function, specially Wisconsin Card Sorting Test (p=0.03), and word generation test (FAS) (p=0.02), improved significantly after a year from the surgery. On verbal memory, language and attention test, there were not significant changes after surgery.      Form the analysis of each patient, after surgery we found a variable outcome with a better prognosis on RATL group. On the studied patients the neuropsychological profile was characterized by material-specific (verbal/visual) memory deficits. We found better prognosis after surgery when they had visual memory deficits and a RATL as was described by other authors.