Impaired consciousness in absence epilepsy: behavioral and electro-encephalographic investigations
Details

UNIL restricted access
State: Public
Version: After imprimatur
License: Not specified
Serval ID
serval:BIB_EA8478E55EC5
Type
A Master's thesis.
Publication sub-type
Master (thesis) (master)
Collection
Publications
Institution
Title
Impaired consciousness in absence epilepsy: behavioral and electro-encephalographic investigations
Director(s)
LEBON S.
Institution details
Université de Lausanne, Faculté de biologie et médecine
Publication state
Accepted
Issued date
2021
Language
english
Number of pages
25
Abstract
Context
Absences are generalized non-motor seizures. They are associated with various deficits including loss of responsiveness to higher order tasks such as choice encoding, verbal responses and motor, complex decisions and memory. The aim of our study is to use a simple cognitive task to analyze what children recall from their absence seizure and to explore the hypothetical influencers. We hypothesized that these variations could be explained by the duration of the absence, which in turn could depend on the extent of neuronal networks involved.
Method
Analyzing EEGs, we selected a cognitive auditory recognition task to evaluate if the information was memorized and, for the prospective part if we could induce it with a visual forced-choice. Using a multilevel logistic regression model, we analyzed the correlation between the restitution and predictors including seizures’ duration, anti-seizure medication, sex and age.
Results
Forty-six absences from 18 patients were analyzed. Verbal information was restituted in one third of cases. None of the patients submitted to the visual forced-choice was able to render the word heard during the absence seizure. Anti-seizure medication was the only statistically significant predictor of absence duration. The selected predictors only explained 18.5% of the variance. Two thirds of this unexplained variance was due to inter-patients differences, one third to intra-patient differences after adjusting for the selected predictors. The only statistically significant predictor of the probability of restitution of verbal information was the time between the stimuli and the end of the absence. The shorter this time, the greater the probability of restitution. Electro-encephalographic information, medication, age and sex were all non- significant regarding the probability of restitution.
Absences are generalized non-motor seizures. They are associated with various deficits including loss of responsiveness to higher order tasks such as choice encoding, verbal responses and motor, complex decisions and memory. The aim of our study is to use a simple cognitive task to analyze what children recall from their absence seizure and to explore the hypothetical influencers. We hypothesized that these variations could be explained by the duration of the absence, which in turn could depend on the extent of neuronal networks involved.
Method
Analyzing EEGs, we selected a cognitive auditory recognition task to evaluate if the information was memorized and, for the prospective part if we could induce it with a visual forced-choice. Using a multilevel logistic regression model, we analyzed the correlation between the restitution and predictors including seizures’ duration, anti-seizure medication, sex and age.
Results
Forty-six absences from 18 patients were analyzed. Verbal information was restituted in one third of cases. None of the patients submitted to the visual forced-choice was able to render the word heard during the absence seizure. Anti-seizure medication was the only statistically significant predictor of absence duration. The selected predictors only explained 18.5% of the variance. Two thirds of this unexplained variance was due to inter-patients differences, one third to intra-patient differences after adjusting for the selected predictors. The only statistically significant predictor of the probability of restitution of verbal information was the time between the stimuli and the end of the absence. The shorter this time, the greater the probability of restitution. Electro-encephalographic information, medication, age and sex were all non- significant regarding the probability of restitution.
Keywords
absence epilepsy, attention, executive functions, electroencephalogram analysis, consciousness
Create date
07/09/2022 14:57
Last modification date
21/09/2023 5:58