title: Mesial temporal seizures may enhance complex reaction time test performance.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  Probing of cognitive functions during seizures is an underdeveloped area of clinical epileptology. Transient cognitive impairment occurs sometime after electrographic onset in certain localization-related epilepsies, but precisely when and what alterations ensue are unknown. Answers to these questions were sought in the context of assessment of feasibility of automated seizure warning.
  
  
  METHODS
  Subjects undergoing evaluation for invasive epilepsy surgery were administered a complex reaction time test triggered automatically by the detection of seizures. Performance during seizures was compared during randomly chosen interictal periods, using the Kolmogorov-Smirnov test.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Statistically significant improvement in the performance of certain test metrics was observed in 3 of 14 subjects during seizures of mesial temporal lobe origin.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Based on these data, it is plausible that activation of central noradrenergic and dopaminergic networks by ictal activity originating from mesial temporal structures may, under particular conditions, optimize certain complex reaction time responses. If reproduced, these findings would a force a revision of the binary tenet that seizures either degrade or spare cognitive functions and open unsuspected research vistas.
authors: University of Kansas Medical Center, Kansas City, KS, USA. iosorio@kumc.edu
authors: Ivan
authors: I
authors: Osorio
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000465:Algorithms; D001300:Audiometry, Evoked Response; D003072:Cognition Disorders / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000209:etiology*; D004569:Electroencephalography; D004833:Epilepsy, Temporal Lobe / Q000150:complications*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D011930:Reaction Time / Q000502:physiology*; D017603:Signal Detection, Psychological / Q000502:physiology*; D055815:Young Adult