Absence epilepsy might build its own nest

Spike-and-Wave Discharges Are Not Pathological Sleep Spindles, Network-Level Aspects of Age-Dependent Absence Seizure Development in Rats

“…ETX exerts its pharmacological effect mainly via blocking T-type Ca 2ϩ channels, although it has other targets as well and its seizure suppression effect is not confined to the thalamus (Manning et al, 2004). Thus, it has to be further investigated whether the frequent seizing is impairing the thalamocortical circuitry (Kozak, 2019) or a maturation-related cellular alteration may be in favor of seizure spread and causing spindle initiation difficulties in an already epileptic brain. Nevertheless, the restoration of sleep spindles by the antiepileptic drug of ETX suggests a network effect of channel deficiencies which causes spindle initiation difficulties in the epileptic brain, especially since the on-demand seizure control did not have similar positive effect on sleep spindles.…”

“…However, these questions are of a particular interest, as a recent study suggest that frequent seizures in absence epilepsy might alter the cortical microcircuitry in the seizure initiation zone (Studer et al, 2019). Thus, as fully developed absence epilepsy is a global phenomenon, it is reasonable to consider and investigate whether the out-of-focus cortical areas undergo changes due to the abundant seizures invading the whole cortex (Kozak, 2019).…”

Investigation of the absence epilepsy in freely moving Long-Evans rats

“…ETX exerts its pharmacological effect mainly via blocking T-type Ca2 + -channels, although it has other targets as well and its seizure suppression effect is not confined to the thalamus (Manning et al, 2004). Thus, it has to be further investigated whether the frequent seizing is impairing the thalamocortical circuitry (Kozak, 2019) or a maturationrelated cellular alteration may be in favor of seizure spread and causing spindle initiation difficulties in an already epileptic brain. Nevertheless, the restoration of sleep spindles by the antiepileptic drug of ETX suggests a network effect of channel deficiencies which causes spindle initiation difficulties in the epileptic brain, especially since the on-demand seizure control did not have similar positive effect on sleep spindles.…”

“…Channel and receptor deficiencies (Crunelli and Leresche, 2002) which are thought to be the underlying cause of the seizuresmight not explain all the features of absence epilepsy and the co-occurring morbidities. It is plausible to assume, that the cortical microcircuitry might be altered as a consequence of frequent seizing, which affects cortical processing (Studer et al, 2018;Kozak, 2019). Altogether, despite the genotypic and phenotypic variations of absence epilepsy are relatively well studied, we still have scarce knowledge on the epileptogenesis in the seizure-susceptible brain.…”