THE EFFICACY OF ANTI-EPILEPTIC TREATMENT IN ADULTS BEFORE AND AFTER ITS CORRECTION BY EPILEPTOLOGIST

Abstract

A comparison was made between the efficacy of anti-epileptic (AE) outpatient treatment which was initially prescribed by neurologist, and that after therapy correction by qualified epileptologist. The prospective study enrolled 310 subjects (69.03% of females and 30.97% of males) with different types of seizures. The mean age of patients was 29.8 ± 8.7 years, duration of disease was 13.01 ± 6.7 years, and the mean age at the onset of disease was 16.8 ± 8.5 years. After treatment correction by epileptologist the share of “new generation” AE drugs has gone up significantly, and the size of administration of basic AE drugs also increased, with increased share of dosage forms with active substance controlled release. The prolonged forms of valproic acid started to be used 1.75-fold more often (from 20.6% to 36.13%), and carbamazepine by 2-fold more often (from 7.09% to 14.19%). In a year after treatment correction the medicinal remission was attained in 51.2% of patients (n = 159), and seizures became rarer (>50% - <100%) in 42.58% of patients (n = 132). Treatment appeared to be inefficient in only 6.1% of patients (n = 19). The annual frequency of seizures before and after optimization was 255.6 ± 999.6 and 19.4 ± 75.9, respectively. The inefficiency in diagnosis and treatment of epilepsy was revealed at the district polyclinic neurologist level, which indicates the requirement for close interaction between neurologists from different medical facilities.