![]() | Only 14 pages are availabe for public view |
Abstract Epileptic seizure is a transient occurrence of signs and/or symptoms due to abnormal excessive or synchronous neuronal activity in the brain. Vestibular symptoms as dizziness, unsteadiness, imbalance, ataxia and rotational vertigo are frequently reported as common ictal manifestations of many focal epileptic seizures (6). The aim of the study was to assess VOR function in epileptic patients. In this clinical study, 80 subjects with age range (20-40 years), 40 of them were normal subjects not complaining from any dizzy symptoms, 40 of them were recruited from neurology clinic at Menoufia university hospitals, diagnosed as epileptic patients according to the criteria of international league against epilepsy classification. The included patients were submitted to full history taking, neurological assessment, office tests, otoscopic examination, audiological assessment and vestibular evaluation in the form of videonystagmography and video head impulse test. The current study demonstrated that vestibular symptoms are common in epileptic patients. VNG tests, included in this study, spontaneous nystagmus, gaze evoked, oculomotor tests (saccade, smooth pursuit, optokinetic tests), head shake and positional tests. According to VNG test, the VNG abnormalities were reported in 7/40 (17.5%) patients in the epileptic group in the saccade and pursuit test, 7 (17.5%) epileptic patients had abnormal velocity (slow) in the saccade test and 4 of them (10 %) had also saccadic intrusions in the pursuit test. vHIT was used to assess the functional status of each of the six semicircular canals individually. The vHIT abnormalities, in at least one canal of the 6 semi-circular canals, was encountered in 72.5% of epileptic cases which may be due to central or peripheral affection. The vHIT abnormalities in epilepsy were either low or high gain of the VOR but the high gain in vHIT was the most frequently encountered abnormality in epileptic patients in this study. Eight patients in the study group (20%) had low gain, 21/40 patients (52.5%) had high gain. In summary, vestibular system may be affected with epilepsy. The vHIT abnormalities, especially high gain, was frequently encountered in epileptic patients in the current study. |