Neurológia pre prax 2/2011

Ictal bradycardia and asystole in patients with focal epilepsy – a retrospective study

We retrospectively analyzed the data of all patients with focal epilepsy who underwent a video EEG test at the Brno Epilepsy Centre during a period of two years (from 2/2008 to 2/2010). A total of 193 patients and 894 seizures were analyzed. We evaluated the ECG 1 minute prior to the seizure, during the seizure and 3 minutes post-seizure. Ictal bradycardia or asystole was found in three patients (1,5 %) and eight seizures (0,9 %). One patient (2 seizures) had ictal bradycardia and two patients (6 seizures) had ictal asystole.

Keywords: focal epilepsy, bradycardia, asystole.