Invasive explorations in children younger than 3 years.

Purpose: In children with drug-resistant focal epilepsy who are candidates for surgery, invasive exploration is sometimes required. However, this is being controversially discussed for children younger than 3 years. The question of its necessity, feasibility and its risks is often raised, since it concerns primarily lesional epilepsy and a lesionectomy might be proposed right away.

Spatiotemporal source analysis in scalp EEG vs. intracerebral EEG and SPECT: a case study in a 2-year-old child.

Objective: This case study aims to demonstrate that spatiotemporal spike discrimination and source analysis are effective to monitor the development of sources of epileptic activity in time and space. Therefore, they can provide clinically useful information allowing a better understanding of the pathophysiology of individual seizures with time- and space-resolved characteristics of successive epileptic states, including interictal, preictal, postictal, and ictal states.

Methods: High spatial resolution scalp EEGs (HR-EEG) were acquired from a 2-year-old girl with refractory central epilepsy and single-focus seizures as confirmed by intracerebral EEG recordings and ictal single-photon emission computed tomography (SPECT).

Heterotopia associated with hippocampal sclerosis: an under-recognized cause of early onset epilepsy in children operated on for temporal lobe epilepsy.

Purpose: The aim of this study is to report on 52 children operated on for pharmacoresistant temporal lobe epilepsy, with special emphasis on histopathology and correlation with clinical features.

Methods: Charts were retrospectively analyzed. All children underwent comprehensive clinical, electrophysiological and radiological investigations before surgery.

Foramen ovale electrodes in the preoperative evaluation of temporal lobe epilepsy in children.

Purpose: Foramen ovale electrodes (FOEs) can localize the epileptogenic zone in adults with mesial temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE). Our aim was to investigate the feasibility and safety of using FOEs to investigate refractory TLE in children.

Methods: Thirty-eight children with seizure semiology and video-EEG (electroencephalography) consistent with medically refractory TLE, and/or the presence of a lesion in the temporal lobe, had FOEs inserted.

[Epilepsy surgery during infancy and early childhood in France].

Background And Purpose: We present the epilepsy surgery activity in infants and children at the Fondation Rothschild Hospital, the main center dedicated to this activity in France.

Method: A prospective study was conducted from 2003 to 2007 based on three populations: (1) children selected as candidates for surgery, (2) children undergoing presurgical evaluation and (3) children undergoing surgical procedures for epilepsy.

Results: Children selected as candidates for surgery: 304 children were referred and discussed by our multidisciplinary staff.