New MRI Method Offers Hope for Patients with Severe Epilepsy

EpilepsyUSA staff
Posted: July 20, 2006

Researchers at the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, based at McGill University in Montreal , Quebec, Canada, have found a way to use MRI scans to detect tiny brain lesions in people with severe epilepsy. This may make surgical treatment available to many more patients whose seizures can't be controlled with medication.

Epilepsy surgery is considered one of the most successful methods of epilepsy treatment; however, it is not an option for patients with hard-to-find or inoperable epileptic foci. For those patients, this discovery might offer new hope.

"The advanced methods we propose could reduce the complexity and cost of pre-surgical evaluation, and improve our understanding of the cause of epilepsy," said Andrea Bernasconi, M.D., the study's lead investigator.

"Improvements in the sensitivity of MR imaging techniques have been a major benefit in determining where seizures originate from," said Brien Smith, M.D., a member of the Epilepsy Foundation's professional advisory board. "Patients who in presurgical evaluations were considered complex cases because their MRI's were considered normal, may be considered better candidates with this imaging method. It highlights subtle areas of cortical dysplasia not previously appreciated."

Bernasconi's study results were published in the January 2006 issue of the medical journal Epilepsia.