Abstracts

Studies discussing neurological outcome with prematurely born children are mainly oriented towards motor development evaluation. It is now accepted that damage to brain-tissue partly occurs due to prenatal pathological occurrences. The present research was aimed at establishing whether antepartally developed periventricular damage of brain-tissue with prematures can cause development of epilepsy in the early ages., The research included 105 high-risk prematures with completed brain ultrasound during the first week. Following the medical documentation we categorised their ultrasound readings according to the measure of brain damage as well as regarding the approximate time of the occurrence of the damage. The potential prognostic factors were compared with the incidence of epilepsy. By the binary logistic regression method, the relative risk of the occurrence was established for the potential factors., During the 6[ndash]8 years of following the cases up we have ascertained epileptic occurrence with 11.4% of our patients. Most frequent form of epilepsy was the West syndrome, occurring with 5.7% of all patients. Gestational age, birth-weight, presence of perinatal asphyxia and intrauterine growth retardation proved to be statistically unconnected with epileptic occurrences. Employment of tocolitic therapy was correlated with increased risk of epilepsy, but the difference still isn[apos]t statistically significant. Correlation of a subsequent epileptic occurrence and of hemorrhagic as well as ischemic white matter damage proved to be statistically significant (p[lt]0.05); however, when perinatal lesions were divided, based upon the ultrasound criteria, into antepartal and postnatal subgroups and when their respective correlation with the outcome was ascertained, the only statistically significant brain-damage related to epilepsy proved to be such as originating before birth., The presence of prenatal brain pathology is mostly important for the development of epilepsy in prematurely born children. The concluding process of brain cortex formation going on during the final trimester of pregnancy is likely to be opening possibility of secondary cortical brain damage following the primary exposure of white matter.,