Patients with epilepsy can experience different neuropsychiatric symptoms related (peri-ictal) or not (interictal) with seizures. Peri-ictal symptoms can precede (pre-ictal) or follow (post-ictal) the seizure, or even be the expression of the seizure activity (ictal). Neuropsychiatric symptoms, such as irritability and apathy, are among the most frequent pre-ictal manifestations. Ictal fear is reported by around 10% of patients with focal seizures, and sometimes can be difficult to differentiate from panic attacks. Post-ictal anxiety, mood and psychotic symptoms are also frequently reported by patients. Peri-ictal phenomena can occur as isolated symptom or as a cluster of symptoms, sometimes resembling a full-blown psychiatric syndrome. Actually, peri-ictal and interictal neuropsychiatric manifestations seem to be closely associated.
Keywords: Anti-depressants; Anti-psychotics; Apathy; Dysphoric symptoms; Forced normalization; Ictal fear; Ictal symptoms; Interictal symptoms; Irritability; Para-ictal symptoms; Peri-ictal symptoms; Post-ictal anxiety; Post-ictal depression; Post-ictal psychoses; Post-ictal symptoms; Pre-ictal symptoms.
© 2021. The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.