Anthony Simon Harvey

The relationship between hippocampal sclerosis, febrile seizures, and complex partial seizures in temporal lobe epilepsy continues to be the subject of great debate in the literature. Hippocampal sclerosis is reported infrequently in young children with temporal lobe epilepsy, a factor that has supported the theory that hippocampal sclerosis develops in later life during the course of recurrent complex partial seizures. In a blinded review of magnetic resonance imaging in 53 children, ...

PURPOSE: Vagus nerve stimulation (VNS) is used increasingly as adjunctive therapy for refractory epilepsy. Studies of VNS in children report mainly seizure frequency reduction as a measure of efficacy and clinical details are often scanty. We report our experience with VNS in children with refractory epilepsy and emphasize the positive effects of VNS in terms of seizure severity.

METHODS: We reviewed 26 consecutive children who had VNS with a minimum follow-up period of 18 months. We ...

PURPOSE: Assessment of language dominance with functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) and neuropsychological evaluation is often used prior to epilepsy surgery. This study explores whether language lateralization and cognitive performance are systematically related in young patients with focal epilepsy.

METHODS: Language fMRI and neuropsychological data (language, visuospatial functions, and memory) of 40 patients (7-18 years of age) with unilateral, refractory focal epilepsy in ...

OBJECTIVE: Hypothalamic hamartomas (HHs) are associated with precocious puberty and gelastic epilepsy; the seizures are often refractory to antiepileptic medications and associated with delayed development and disturbed behavior. The current opinion is that surgery to treat intrahypothalamic lesions is formidable and that complete excision is not technically achievable. We report our experience with a transcallosal approach to the resection of HHs.

METHODS: Five children (age, 4-13 yr) ...

Seventeen ictal 99mTc-HMPAO single photon emission computed tomography (SPECT) studies were performed in 15 children with temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE) aged 7-14 years (mean 10.3 years). Ictal SPECT was informative in 16 of 17 (94%) studies in 14 of 15 (93%) children, showing unilateral temporal lobe hyperperfusion. In all 16 informative ictal SPECT studies, lateralization was concordant with ictal EEG, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), and pathology. In 4 children, ictal SPECT provided ...

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE: Ipsilateral loss of anterior temporal gray-white matter definition, due mainly to white matter signal intensity abnormality, is frequently seen on MR images of patients with hippocampal sclerosis. Our aim was to determine the prevalence and clinical correlations of these anterior temporal changes in pediatric cases of hippocampal sclerosis and to determine whether cumulative damage from seizures is important for their development.

METHODS: We reviewed the MR ...

BACKGROUND: Phenytoin is the current standard of care for second-line treatment of paediatric convulsive status epilepticus after failure of first-line benzodiazepines, but is only effective in 60% of cases and is associated with considerable adverse effects. A newer anticonvulsant, levetiracetam, can be given more quickly, is potentially more efficacious, and has a more tolerable adverse effect profile. We aimed to determine whether phenytoin or levetiracetam is the superior second-line ...

STUDY OBJECTIVES: To describe the semiological features of NREM arousal parasomnias in detail and identify features that can be used to reliably distinguish parasomnias from nocturnal frontal lobe epilepsy (NFLE).

DESIGN: Systematic semiologial evaluation of parasomnias and NFLE seizures recorded on video-EEG monitoring.

PATIENTS: 120 events (57 parasomnias, 63 NFLE seizures) from 44 subjects (14 males). Interventions. The presence or absence of 68 elemental clinical features was ...

OBJECTIVE: To investigate the clinical utility of current-generation dipole modelling of scalp EEG in focal epilepsies seen commonly in clinical practice.

METHODS: Scalp EEG recordings from 10 patients with focal epilepsy, five with Benign Focal Epilepsy of Childhood (BFEC) and five with Mesial Temporal Lobe Epilepsy (MTLE), were used for interictal spike dipole modelling using Scan 4.3 and CURRY 5.0. Optimum modelling parameters for EEG source localisation (ESL) were sought by the ...

Sixty-three children with new-onset temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE) underwent extensive clinical, EEG, and neuroimaging investigation as part of a prospective, community-based cohort study of the natural history of TLE in childhood. Complex partial seizures occurred in 94% of the children, and tonic-clonic seizures occurred in 14%. Developmental, behavioral, or learning problems were present in 38%. Eighteen children (29%) had a significant illness/event prior to the onset of TLE, including ...

We used the records of a statewide pediatric mortality surveillance system to determine mortality rates and causes of death in children with epilepsy. Of the 1,095 children aged 1-14 years who died in the state of Victoria during the study period 1985-1989, 93 had a history of epilepsy. Six children (6%) had primary epilepsy, and 87 (94%) had secondary epilepsy. Death was (a) directly attributable to epilepsy in 20 (22%), including 11 with sudden unexplained death, (b) not directly ...

Although certain clinical, electroencephalographic (EEG), magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), and pathologic findings in adults with intractable temporal lobe epilepsy predict seizure outcome following temporal lobectomy, predictors of seizure outcome have not been studied systematically in pediatric temporal lobectomy series. We retrospectively analyzed preoperative clinical, EEG, and neuroimaging findings with reference to seizure outcome (seizure free or non-seizure free) in 33 children ...

PURPOSE: It is often reported that children with temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE) experience nonlateralized memory impairments. However, many of these studies have been exploratory and not based on memory theory. Further, differences between mesial and lateral subgroups have not been adequately examined. This study aimed to discern more specific patterns of memory impairment in children with TLE.

METHODS: Forty-three children (5-16 years) with lesional TLE participated. Subjects were ...

PURPOSE: It remains controversial whether adult-onset idiopathic generalized epilepsy (IGE) is a distinct syndrome or a continuum among IGE syndromes. EEG is the only known biologic marker of IGE and helps differentiate many of its classic subsyndromes. In this study, we looked for the differences in the EEG findings of IGE of classic adolescent onset versus adult onset that may suggest syndromic heterogeneity.

METHODS: Seventy-six patients (47 adolescent-onset IGE, 29 adult-onset IGE) ...