Cohort study of epileptic patients with family history of epilepsy

Background. An impact of burdened family history on epilepsy course and disease outcome remains insufficiently studied.Objective: assessing the rate of achieving remission in epileptic patients with/without burdened family history.Material and methods. The study included 660 patients with a specified family history of epilepsy divided into three groups: Group 1 (n=192) – patients with genetic forms of epilepsy (56 with and 136 without family history); Group 2 (n=148) – patients with structural forms of epilepsy (16 with and 132 without family history); Group 3 (n=320) – patients with epilepsy of unknown etiology and unspecified epilepsy (48 with and 272 without family history). In Group 1, there were significantly more patients with burdened family history (29.2%) than in Group 2 (10.8%) (p<0.01) and Group 3 (15%) (p<0.01). ><0.01). Anamnesis collection, clinical and neurological examination, routine electroencephalography (EEG) and/or video-EEG monitoring, brain magnetic resonance imaging and analysis of medical records were carried out. Therapy was adjusted.Results. In all groups, patients with burdened family history tended to have earlier onset of epilepsy. The frequency of seizures at the onset of the disease did not depend on identified burdened family history of epilepsy. In Group 1, the effectiveness of treatment (rate of achieving remission) in both subgroups was almost identical (p>0.05), whereas in Groups 2 and 3 it tended towards a greater effectiveness of therapy in patients without family history.Conclusion. Epilepsy familial burden depends on the form of the disease and has limited prognostic value regarding disease course and likelihood of achieving remission. It is necessary to increase availability of genetic studies and identify genetic substrate of various epileptic syndromes.