Intensive monitoring of epileptic patients with a history of episodic aggression.

Abstract

Nineteen epileptic patients with significant history of episodic aggressive behavior were subjected to intensive behavioral and electrophysiologic monitoring for an average period of six weeks in a specialized inpatient facility. Numerous seizures were recorded in these patients but none disclosed ictal aggression. Only two patients showed episodic aggressive behavior but in neither case could seizures be implicated causally. The majority of patients showed a remarkable progressive improvement in aggressive tendencies during hospitalization. It is concluded that ictal aggression is rare and that, in most cases, the aggressive behavior in epileptics is a multifactorially determined interictal phenomenon.