Panayiotopoulos syndrome and continuous spike-wave during slow sleep

Síndrome de Panayiotopoulos y punta-onda continua durante el sueño lento

IMAGES IN NEUROLOGY

Panayiotopoulos syndrome and continuous spike-wave during slow sleep

Síndrome de Panayiotopoulos y punta-onda continua durante el sueño lento

Antonio Díaz-Negrillo

Department of Clinical Neurophysiology, Infanta Elena Hospital, Madrid, Spain

^{Correspondence}

A 6-year-old girl suddenly developed a loss of conciousness episode with head deviation to the left, generalized hypertonia, and clonic movements when waking up. Then, she presented vomit and bladder sphincter incontinence. Therefore, the Panayiotopoulos syndrome was suspected. Brain magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) was normal. The electroencephalography (EEG) performed after 48 hours of the episode revealed spike-wave paroxysms in parieto-occipital regions of the left hemisphere (Fig 1). During non-rapid eye movement (NREM) sleep, the EEG showed epileptiform activity of continuous spike-wave greater than 85% (Fig 2).

The Panayiotopoulos syndrome can occur in very rare cases with atypical clinical and EEG findings, being the latter central in determining the patient's prognosis¹.

Received 13 December 2011

Accepted 23 December 2011

Conflict of interest: There is no conflict of interest to declare.

• 1. Caraballo R, Astorino F, Cersósimo R, Soprano AM, Fejerman N. Atypical evolution in childhood epilepsy with occipital paroxysms. Epileptic Disord 2001;3:57-62.

Publication Dates

• Publication in this collection
  11 June 2012
• Date of issue
  June 2012