Abstracts

Rationale: Epilepsy surgery is standard of care, but always raises legitimate questions about risks, both from patients and physicians. Intractable epilepsy is associated with increased mortality. Do people die more of epilepsy surgery or unexpectedly?Methods: We reviewed our experience in order to compare the number of deaths due to epilepsy surgery, versus unexpected deaths of other causes, for the 2001-2006 period.Results: Over a period of 6 years, we performed 282 resective epilepsy surgeries. During this time period, 0 patients died of epilepsy surgery, but 14 patients had unexpected death. Twelve had a localization-related epilepsy, 2 had a primary generalized epilepsy. Four had had epilepsy surgery, 2 had the vagus nerve stimulator. Causes of death were unknown in 11 (found dead with no apparent cause), status epilepticus in 2, and drowning in 1.Conclusions: Epilepsy surgery is safer than intractable epilepsy. Patients with intractable epilepsy have more chances of dying unexpectedly than of epilepsy surgery.