title: Surgical indication for refractory childhood epilepsy.
abstract: Recent progress in surgical intervention for medically refractory epilepsy has helped to shed light on more complex epileptogenic problems in children and infants. Surgical treatment increasingly is being used in pediatric patients, but the indications for surgery in this age group have not been well defined. The developing child with a seizure disorder has several problems that are different from adults, such as neural plasticity, deleterious effects of seizures on developmental status, and spontaneous resolution of epilepsy. The critical age for irreversible brain dysfunction and the timing of surgery are the main issues for the treatment of children. Thus, earlier surgical intervention is generally recommended to prevent further detrimental seizure effects, but we still do not know the optimal age. Until the establishment of guidelines for pediatric epilepsy surgery, surgical indications should be determined by the prognosis and the presence of a resectable epileptogenic focus, which in turn are based on the localization of the epileptic focus, seizure frequency, severity, and cognitive function of each case, rather than just the patient's age.
authors.affiliation: Department of Pediatrics, Tokyo Women's Medical University, Japan.
authors.forename: H
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Oguni
authors.forename: K
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Mukahira
authors.forename: T
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Tanaka
authors.forename: Y
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Awaya
authors.forename: K
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Saito
authors.forename: H
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Shimizu
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Oda
authors.forename: N
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Arai
authors.forename: I
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Suzuki
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Osawa
mesh_terms: D000367:Age Factors; D002648:Child; D004828:Epilepsies, Partial / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000601:surgery; D004827:Epilepsy / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000601:surgery*; D006801:Humans; D009473:Neuronal Plasticity; D017410:Practice Guidelines as Topic; D011379:Prognosis; D012720:Severity of Illness Index; D016896:Treatment Outcome