J Neuropsychiatry Clin Neurosci 1993; 5:283-286
Copyright © 1993 by American Neuropsychiatric Association
Relationship of seizure variables to personality disorders in epilepsy
MF Mendez, RC Doss, JL Taylor and R Arguello
Department of Neurology, St. Paul-Ramsey Medical Center, University of Minnesota 55101.
Among epileptic patients, personality disorders may be associated with
specific seizure manifestations. In an epilepsy clinic, we identified 42
idiopathic epilepsy patients diagnosed with various DSM-III-R personality
disorders, including borderline, atypical or mixed, explosive, and
dependent. When compared with 42 age- and sex-matched epileptic control
subjects on six seizure variables, the personality disorder group had more
patients with epileptic auras (P = 0.001), particularly "cephalic" auras,
and fewer with secondarily generalized tonic-clonic seizures (P < 0.05).
These findings suggest that the experience of epileptic auras contributes
to the development of personality disorders, especially when auras are not
masked by secondarily generalized seizures.
