Movement Disorders Miscliagnosecl as Epilepsy

摘要

Seizures are paroxysmal alterations of behavior and consciousness secondary to abnormal and excessive electrical discharges from the brain. However, not all paroxysmal events are seizures and children with epilepsy or who are neurologically impaired can have non-epileptic paroxysmal (NEP) events. About 20-25% of children referred to an epilepsy unit with a diagnosis of epilepsy will have non-epileptic paroxysmal events. Among the NEP, paroxysmal movement disorders are often mistaken for epileptic seizures. These are classified according to its phenomenology (athetosis, chorea, ballism, dystonia, myoclonus, parkinsonism, stereotypy, tics or tremors). Differentiation is made on whether the events are primarily nocturnal or not and whether they are hyperkinetic or hypokinetic. Video presentation of various patients with myoclonus of various etiologies, shuddering attacks, paroxysmal kinesogenic dyskinesia, dystonia and choreoathetosis as in Sydenham's chorea are presented.