Status epilepticus (SE) represents a neurological emergency that leads to considerable morbidity and mortality. Following failure of first-line therapy, usually with benzodiazepines, there is no clear evidence to guide treatment of refractory SE, although a wide variety of approaches has been described anecdotally.
The aim of this study was to assess the clinical response to corticosteroids in adults with refractory and super-refractory SE, describing, to the best of our knowledge, the first adult SE cohort treated with corticosteroids.
We retrospectively analysed our adult SE registry (2006-2017), identifying 15 out of 987 episodes (1.5%) in which corticosteroids were prescribed de novo as adjuvant therapy to a variety of antiepileptic drug regimens. We analysed incident episodes and defined clinical response as SE ceasing within 1 week of administration, without any other medical intervention.
Out of 987 SE episodes, 15 (1.5%) were treated with de novo corticosteroids, corresponding to 12 patients, with increasing prevalence as the SE became refractory (10/411; 2.4% of episodes) and super-refractory (5/108; 4.6% of episodes). One patient (a woman with Rasmussen encephalitis) presented with four SE episodes over a period of 3 years, so only her index SE episode was included in subsequent analyses. The episodes treated were predominantly of inflammatory origin (6/12), such as autoimmune or Rasmussen encephalitis. In five out of 12 (42%) of the considered incident episodes, SE resolved following corticosteroids (all within 3 days). The outcome was better in this responders group (for 2/5 episodes, patients did not have a new handicap at discharge, versus 0/7 in non-responders). In patients with inflammatory and acute symptomatic causes, global prognosis was better than in those with progressive or neurodegenerative aetiologies (6/8 vs. 4/4 had a new handicap at discharge or died).
Our observations seem to support the use of corticosteroids, especially for acute SE of putative inflammatory origin; these compounds, however, were prescribed infrequently.