Abstract
Landau-Kleffner syndrome (LKS) is a rare but well-known epileptic syndrome in children, occurring in children who have already developed age-appropriate speech. It is characterized by marked deterioration of language functions, especially with perceptive language impairment. We report a 9 year-old boy in which LKS was successfully treated with Ethyl loflazepate. He could speak at 3years old, but gradually lost his words. At 4 years old he was observed absent-minded and he did not understand even simple verbal commands. EEG during the awake state demonstrated multiple focal spikes and waves, and showed diffuse spikes and waves continuously during the sleep stage. Sodium valproate, clonazepam, steroid therapy are reported to be effective in some cases of LKS but our patient did not respond to these drugs. Ethyl loflazepate is a new benzodiazepate drug and recently it has been tried for pediatric intractable epilepsies. We tried Ethyl loflazepate for the treatment. Tongue and lip movements were improved and the drooling was disappeared. EEG showed marked improvement. There has been no side effect for 2years. To our knowledge, the report of Ethyl loflazepate treatment in children is few. Ethyl loflazepate is supposed to worth used for the treatment on LKS reluctant to conventional anti-epileptic drugs.
