Abstracts

With the aim to establish effectiveness of intermittent oral diazepam therapy for febrile seizures, an early phase II clinical therapy trial was conducted at Camaguey[apos]s Pediatric Hospital in Cuba. One hundred and twenty (120) children with this diagnosis were randomly chosen from the Outpatient Clinic. They were equally divided into three groups: the first group in which diazepam was only used during febrile episodes, the second treated with continuous use of anticonvulsants ( Phenobarbital or sodium valproate) and the third as a control group with no treatment. In order to evaluate the effectiveness of the treatment groups, information was collected on recurrence of febrile seizures, febrile episodes without seizoures, duration of seizures, electroencephalogram (EEG) recordings and drug related adverse effects. The data werw stadistically analyzed by inferential and descriptive tests (Test of Proportion Hypothesis). The results show that the intermittent diazepam group had less recurrence of febrile seizures ( p=0.000006 ), a greater number of febrile episodes without seizures, nonlengthning of seizures, better EEG recording and lesser adverse drug related effects. Intermittent oral diazepan therapy may reduce the risk of incidence of febrile seizures.