Objective: To analyse the epidemiological, clinical and developmental characteristics of Rolandic epilepsy as an aid to its suspected diagnosis in daily clinical practice.
Patients and methods: The medical records of 56 patients with Rolandic epilepsy were reviewed in order to collect epidemiological and clinical features, results of complementary examinations and developmental data. The criteria defined by the International League Against Epilepsy (ILAE) were used in the diagnosis.
Results: Mean age at diagnosis was 7.7 years. In all, 62.5 % were diagnosed at school age, with a higher prevalence of males (58.9 %). Seizures occurred during sleep in 84.4 % of patients, and they were mainly characterised by hemifacial seizures with eye deviation and/or headaches (76.8 %), hypersalivation (44.6 %), guttural sounds (30.6 %), secondary generalised tonic-clonic (35.7 %) and/or unilateral clonic or tonic seizures (26.8 %), dysarthria (17.9 %) and unilateral paresthesias (16.1 %). Inter-ictal EEG showed paroxysms in the centrotemporal regions, frequently unilateral (78.6 %). Of all recurrences, 50.7 % occurred during the first 12 months after diagnosis, 24.6 % between 12 and 24 months after diagnosis, and 24.6 % between 2 and 4 years of follow up. Two patients with atypical progression were recorded: a case with epilepsy with continuous spikes and waves during slow-wave sleep, and another case with a Landau-Kleffner syndrome.
Conclusions: Rolandic epilepsy is a common type of epilepsy in the pediatric age group and generally begins at school-aged children. Its semiological sequence is fairly characteristic, and finding centrotemporal spikes is considered as necessary for the syndromic diagnosis. The prognosis is excellent; however, as a few patients may progress to atypical outcomes and/or neuropsychological deficits, a rigorous developmental control of these patients should be of the highest priority.