Abstracts

Summary: Children with epilepsy with average intelligence but without neurological handicaps and neuroradiological abnormalities have frequent cognitive, linguistic, and psychopathology comorbidities, However, the structure, function, and underlying neural mechanisms of brain development in the children with and without these comorbidities, an NINDS "comorbidity benchmark," remain unclear and a subject of both clinical and basic science research. This workshop will bring together researchers on comorbidities, neuroimaging, and basic science to integrate the comorbidity and multimodal neuroimaging findings in these children with cognitive and behavioral impairments evident in animal models of seizures. To do this, Bruce Hermann will describe baseline and prospective volumetric and morphometric findings and their association with cognition in children with recent onset epilepsy with and without comorbidities. Rochelle Caplan will discuss volumetric, morphometric, and MRS data related to a broad range of psychopathology in children with epilepsy. Hal Blumenfeld will relate ictal fMRI, interictal DTI, and resting functional connectivity in childhood epilepsy, as well as fMRI network abnormalities to direct neuronal recordings in animal models of childhood epilepsy. Integrating the findings of the presenters, the general discussion will focus on how to model comorbidities of epilepsy in animals to study the neurobiological connection. Delineation of the mechanisms underlying the comorbidities of pediatric epilepsy is essential because of their role in the lifelong morbidity the illness. The proposed workshop would be a first step towards integrating the findings of research at the behavioral, neuroimaging, and neuronal level to better understand how impaired cognition and behavior reflect the complex effects of the illness (above and beyond the effect of seizures) on neuronal function, neural circuits and connectivity, and microstructural abnormalities. Furthermore, examining the effects of seizures on multiple aspects of brain structure and function will prove essential in developing future translational studies to clarify why children with "epilepsy only" exhibit cognitive deficits and psychopathology.