Surgical Treatment of Intractable Frontal Lobe Epilepsy

Kim, Jung Muk; Kim, Hyoung Ihl; Kim, Keun Su; Kim, Chul Jin; Lee, Jung Chung; Lee, Min Chul

Abstract

Recent advances of neuroimaging and electrophysiological monitoring technique have contributed in improving the surgical outcome of frontal lobe epilepsy. The authors have analysed 36 consecutive cases of intractable frontal lobe epilepsy that were treated at our institute between September, 1992 and December, 1995 to determine the clinical, electrophysiological, and neuroimaging characteristics as well as to delineate the efficacy of surgical treatment in improving the seizure outcome. The patients consisted of 19 males and 17 females. The mean age of the seizure onset and the mean duration of epilepsy were 14.9 and 11.6 years, respectively. Magnetic resonance imaging(MRI) showed no lesion in 9 patients and pathological lesions in 27 patients. The types of the lesions observed included primary brain tumor, mostly low-grade glioma in 10 patients, cortical dysplasia in 4, post-traumatic scar in 4, neocortical gliosis in 3, cyst in 3, and postencephalitic atrophy in 3. Intracranial recordings were performed in 23 cases to determine the epileptogenic zone. The surgical outcome was graded according to Engle's Classification as Class A in 20 patients, Class B in 2, Class C in 9, and Class D in 5. The surgical outcome was promising regardless of the presence or the absence of the lesion on MRI, invasive recording, age of seizure onset, and duration of epilepsy.