Epilepsy as the sole manifestation of brain tumor--report of two cases.

Abstract

Epilepsy may be the earliest and the sole clinical manifestation of a brain tumor. The existence and the character of the brain tumor cannot be predicted based solely on the severity and pattern of seizure. Epilepsy is common in patients with brain tumors, however, it is less common to find brain tumors in patients with epilepsy. Due to the slow progression of brain tumors and limitations in the use of brain computed tomography (CT), it often takes a long time to diagnose brain tumors in an epileptic child. Relief of epilepsy by surgical removal of the etiologic brain tumor appears to be promising. We report two cases of brain tumors presenting as intractable epilepsy with a discordant neuroimage. Therefore for those children taking long-term anticonvulsants with frequent recurrence, it appears reasonable to perform magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to enable discovering of any organic lesions.