Surgical treatment for symptomatic temporal lobe epilepsy in children

Objective To investigate the experience in surgical treatment of symptomatic temporal lobe epilepsy in children. Methods A retrospective analysis was made of 17 children ( 11 boys and 6 girls) with secondary temporal lobe epilepsy who were operated on from January 1994 to August 2002. The age ranged from 3～14 years with an average of 9 years. Of them, 6 cases underwent lesionectomy and 11 pa- tients had lesionectomy combined with anterior temporal lobectomy. Twelve patients who had abnormal wave demonstrated by cortical electrode after operation and received corticectomy for focus of epilepsy and/ or multiple subpartial corticectomy. Results No complication or mortality was happened in all patients. The follow-up results of 16 patients showed a complete seizure control obtained in 12 cases (70.6%), obvi- ous decreased in 3 (17.6 %), and less control in 2 (11.8 %). Conclusion For secondary temporal lobe epilepsy in children, the combined operations are effective to seizure control as safe as regular seizure surgery under the monitor of cortical electrode.