Summary:   Purpose: The effect of unilateral temporal lobectomy on seizure frequency is well recognized, but little is known about the neuropsychological changes that occur after surgical treatment. We assessed neuropsychological status in 26 patients with an average age of 35 years before and after unilateral temporal lobectomy for medically intractable TLE. Methods: Neuropsychological examination to assess cognitive function, memory, attention, visuospatial analysis, language, and emotional functions was performed preoperatively and at 1 month and 1 year after the surgery. Results: At both 1 month and 1 year after the surgery, the patients had improved scores, compared with the preoperative scores, on the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale–Revised (WAIS‐R: verbal IQ, performance IQ, and full‐scale IQ), Wechsler Memory Scale–Revised (WMS‐R: verbal, general, and delayed paired associates memory), and Raven Colored Progressive Matrices. In the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI), significant decreases were observed at 1 year after the surgery in the scores for infrequency, hypochondriasis, psychasthenia, and schizophrenia. Patients in whom the seizures had been relieved postoperatively also had improved scores on the WAIS‐R, WMS‐R, and Raven Colored Progressive Matrices. Conclusions: These data suggest that neuropsychological improvement postoperatively is influenced by the reduction in the frequency of seizures after surgery.

The authors report successful presurgical identification of an epileptic focus in the fusiform gyrus by using ictal magnetoencephalography (MEG), which was performed with the aid of an advanced whole-brain neuromagnetometer. A 22-year-old man had suffered from medically refractory complex partial seizures since he was 10 years of age. Seizure symptoms, magnetic resonance imaging, and ictal single-photon emission computerized tomography examinations indicated right temporal lobe epilepsy; however, ictal electroencephalography, including sphenoidal recordings, failed even to lateralize the seizure focus. The MEG studies revealed that equivalent current dipoles of interictal activities were scattered bilaterally around the medial temporal structures, but those of ictal onset and postictal activities formed a cluster in the left fusiform gyrus. After confirmation of each ictal and interictal MEG finding by using long-term electrocorticography recordings, focal cortical resection of the left inferior temporal and fusiform gyri was performed. The histopathological diagnosis was cortical dysplasia, and the patient has achieved a good seizure outcome, now 15 months after the operation. Ictal and also postictal MEG may be more specific than interictal MEG for identifying the ictal onset zone.

Summary:   Purpose: The effect of unilateral temporal lobectomy on seizure frequency is well recognized, but little is known about the neuropsychological changes that occur after surgical treatment. We assessed neuropsychological status in 26 patients with an average age of 35 years before and after unilateral temporal lobectomy for medically intractable TLE. Methods: Neuropsychological examination to assess cognitive function, memory, attention, visuospatial analysis, language, and emotional functions was performed preoperatively and at 1 month and 1 year after the surgery. Results: At both 1 month and 1 year after the surgery, the patients had improved scores, compared with the preoperative scores, on the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale–Revised (WAIS‐R: verbal IQ, performance IQ, and full‐scale IQ), Wechsler Memory Scale–Revised (WMS‐R: verbal, general, and delayed paired associates memory), and Raven Colored Progressive Matrices. In the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI), significant decreases were observed at 1 year after the surgery in the scores for infrequency, hypochondriasis, psychasthenia, and schizophrenia. Patients in whom the seizures had been relieved postoperatively also had improved scores on the WAIS‐R, WMS‐R, and Raven Colored Progressive Matrices. Conclusions: These data suggest that neuropsychological improvement postoperatively is influenced by the reduction in the frequency of seizures after surgery.

Summary:  Purpose: The purpose of this study was to clarify and compare the influence of surgical strategy on relief from seizures in patients with focal cortical dysplasia (FCD) and those with dysembryoplastic neuroepithelial tumor (DNT). Methods: Six patients with FCD and five patients with DNT, all of whom underwent surgical resection for medically intractable epilepsy, were compared in terms of presurgical seizure types and frequency, location of lesions, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), single‐photon emission computed tomography (SPECT) with 99mTc‐ECD, scalp electroencephalogram (EEG), and long‐term video‐EEG recording. Prolonged subdural recordings and intraoperative electrocorticograms (ECoG) were analyzed. The influences of surgical strategies on seizure outcomes were retrospectively analyzed. Results: In all the FCD patients, ictal SPECT revealed hyperperfusion in the regions where MRI showed FCD. Interictal epileptiform activity and ictal seizure onset on ECoG performed with subdural electrodes were localized on the FCD itself. In contrast, the tumors of all the DNT patients were depicted as hypoperfuse areas on interictal SPECT scans. Ictal SPECT in one DNT patient showed hyperperfusion in the area enclosing the tumor. Interictal spiking in all DNT patients and ictal seizure onset in two DNT patients were not in the lesions themselves but in an area enclosing the lesion. All but one patient with FCD who underwent total lesionectomy became seizure free. All DNT patients who underwent resection of the epileptogenic cortex associated with lesionectomy became seizure free or achieved a 90% reduction in seizures. Conclusions: FCD has intrinsic epileptogenicity, whereas DNT is encompassed by epileptogenic cortical areas. Therefore, total lesionectomy is an essential strategy for FCD, whereas resection of the epileptic focus associated with lesionectomy of a DNT lesion is necessary to control seizures.

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to clarify and compare the influence of surgical strategy on relief from seizures in patients with focal cortical dysplasia (FCD) and those with dysembryoplastic neuroepithelial tumor (DNT).Methods: Six patients with FCD and five patients with DNT, all of whom underwent surgical resection for medically intractable epilepsy, were compared in terms of presurgical seizure types and frequency, location of lesions, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), single-photon emission computed tomography (SPECT) with 99m Tc-ECD, scalp electroencephalogram (EEG), and long-term video-EEG recording. Prolonged subdural recordings and intraoperative electrocorticograms (ECoG) were analyzed. The influences of surgical strategies on seizure outcomes were retrospectively analyzed.Results: In all the FCD patients, ictal SPECT revealed hyperperfusion in the regions where MRI showed FCD. Interictal epileptiform activity and ictal seizure onset on ECoG performed with subdural electrodes were localized on the FCD