P 93 How does the vestibular function change after selective amygdalahipoocampectomy by stereotactic Laser-Thermoablation?

Abstract

Objectives: The medial temporal lobe, centered in hippocampus, is known to receive vestibular input for processing spatial information. Patients with medial temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE) perform significantly worse on tests assessing clinical balance, path integration and rotational memory abilities. It is unknown whether a novel laser surgical procedure for removal of epileptic loci in the medial temporal lobe leads to improvement in these abilities. The goal of this study was to compare deficits related to clinical balance, path integration and rotational memory pre- and post-surgery in patients with medial (TLE). Methods: Five patients with medial TLE (41.4±17.0 years, 2 females) underwent a test battery that assessed vestibular-MTL functions both pre- and post-surgery: clinical balancing, path integration (triangle completion test) and rotational memory. All tests tests took place within one month before and after surgery. Results: Compared with pre-surgery assessment, the TLE-patients did not perform significantly better on any of the tests post-surgery. However, the effect sizes on each of the tests were large to very large in favor of the post-surgery assessment. Conclusion: Although the results were not significant, the obtained effect sizes indicate a potential benefit of the novel laser surgical procedure in TLE-patients‘ clinical balancing, path integration and rotational memory abilities. To confirm these findings, further studies on larger cohorts of patients are necessary.