Clinical and basic studies on the diagnosis of epileptogenic foci: Noninvasive localization of epileptogenic foci and development of a novel animal model of epilepsy

摘要

Epilepsy is a chronic, pathophysiological phenomenon of the brain that may occur in all mammalians species. The outward manifestation of epileptic seizures is the transient occurrence of signs or symptoms due to abnormal electrical activity in the brain. Clinical signs of epileptic seizures vary according to the location of the abnormal discharge in the cerebral cortex and the pattern of distribution of the discharge. The area of the brain responsible for generating clinical seizures is the epileptogenic zone, which is defined by anatomic-electro-imaging correlations. Therefore, the location and extent of the epileptogenic zone is never definitively known, but can only be deduced from a variety of diagnostic investigations. The purpose of this studywas to establish a noninvasive method for localizing epileptogenic foci and to develop a novel animal model of epilepsy. Toward this end, we evaluated seizure semiology, electroencephalograms, and structural/functional MRIs, from a standpoint of veterinary clinical and experimental epilepsy studies.