Gender aspects of medico-social adaptation in adults with early onset of epilepsy

Abstract

To study the relationship between indicators of clinical picture and social adaptation in idiopathic and symptomatic epilepsies with onset before adulthood depending on patient's gender. The cross-sectional study was carried out. The study group included 212 women and 171 men, aged 24-60 years, with confirmed diagnosis of epilepsy with onset before 18 years. Seventy-three patients were diagnosed with symptomatic epilepsy, 310 with idiopathic epilepsy. In 120 patients, the frequency of seizures was rarer than once a year. All patients had secondary education and were on treatment with antiepileptic drugs. In symptomatic epilepsy with early onset, gender differences in family and educational status were not identified. Regardless of gender, patients with myoclonus had higher education more frequently than patients with absence and tonic-clonic seizures. Patients with the combination of different types of seizures, irrespective from etiology and gender, had secondary education more frequently. Women with rare generalized seizures more frequently had higher education and were married. Unmarried men with rare generalized seizures lived separately from their relatives more frequently. To author's opinion, the contradiction in indicators of social adaptation in men with rare generalized seizures, to the great extent, is related to the phenomenon of self-stigmatization than to the influence of disease. The results can be used in rehabilitation of patients with idiopathic epilepsy syndromes.