| Popis: |
Recent trends in management of patients with epilepsy indicate for monotherapy rather than polytherapy. Very little information regarding the current epilepsy pharmacotherapy practices in Croatia is available. Types of epilepsy were classified according to the proposed classification of epilepsies and epileptic syndromes (Aicardi J. Epilepsy in children. 2nd ed. New York, Raven Press, 1994:13). We reviewed the medical histories of patients hospitalised in the Neuropediatrics Department of the Paediatric Clinic of University Hospital “ Sestre Milosrdnice” in Zagreb. We studied 295 children (160 boys and 135 girls) with epilepsy aged 4 month to 16 years. Complex partial seizures occurred in 57.8% of patients, generalized epilepsy in 23.6%, and epileptic syndromes in 14.4% ; 4.2% remained unclassified. In all, 71.4% were receiving monotherapy, 26.8% received two antiepileptic drugs, and 1.8% received three or more. Carbamazepine 52.8% was the commonest antiepileptic drug used singly, followed by valproate/valpromide (30.1%), phenobarbital (10.5%), vigabatrin (2.5%), lamotrigine (1.5%), sulthiame (0.8%) and ethosuximide (0.8%). Among the patients receiving two antiepileptic drugs, the combination of carbamazepine and valproate/valpromide (47%) was the commonest. Current practice in our departement is to use monotherapy for control of epilepsy in most patients, and carbamazepine is the commonest drug used. For intractable epilepsies, we treat most children with polytherapy, but recently we have obtained good control of seizures using the third generation of antiepileptic drugs as monotherapy. |
