LANDAU-KLEFFNER-TYPE SYNDROME IN CHILDREN WITH DRUG-RESISTANT SYMPTOMATIC EPILEPSY
Journal Title: Acta Neuropsychologica - Year 2014, Vol 12, Issue 4
Abstract
Purpose: To compare the severity and features of language disorders with the localization of brain lesions in children with epilepsyinducing cortical dysplasias.Results: The cognitive performance of 20 children with cortical dysplasias of different localization was evaluated. All patients also underwent EEG and MRI studies. The severity of language disorders depends on the age of seizures-onset and its frequency. Losses of language in children occur regardless of the side and localization of the epileptogenic focus. The language functions are intact if the epilepsy-onset was at school-going age and if the seizures are rare. The loss of language or its retrogression can be observed in preschoolers that have daily repeated seizures with secondary generalization. This disorder resembles Landau-Kleffner syndrome, but cannot be classified as aphasia. In the case of severe seizure frequency, language deterioration is accompanied by an executive function deficit. Conclusions: The “youngest” cognitive functions in phylogenesis and ontogenesis (language and executive functions) are the most vulnerable in children with drug-resistant epilepsies. We assume that severe language impairments in children with Landau-kleffner-type syndrome induced by focal cortical dysplasias are not aphasia as a localization-related disturbance associated with focal brain lesion. They are related to aberrant reorganization in the whole language dynamic system. We suggest that the proper way to call observed language disorders is not an “acquired epileptic aphasia” or “total aphasia”, but “retrogression of language development”.
Authors and Affiliations
Svetlana Buklina, Irina Nagorskaya, Alexander Golovteev
Keywords
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