Abstract
We evaluated the efficacy of clonazepam (CZP) treatment for Rolandic discharge (RD) in patients suffering from benign childhood epilepsy with centro-temporal spikes (BCECT). Twenty newly diagnosed patients received CZP twice a day. The dose administered ranged form 0.35 to 1.0mg/day. Both before and one month after the institution of the medication, the EEGs of each patient were evaluated in both the awake and natural sleeping states.
The RD disappeared in the EEG of 15 patients one month after beginning the medication. We also recorded the EEGs in 13 patients one week after starting the medication. In 6 of these 13 patients the RD had already disappeared by that point.
In 12 of 15 patients whose RD disappeared one month after the start of medication, the efficacies of CZP for RD in EEG and for seizures were continuously investigated for from 8 months to 6 years and 8 months. RD appeared again in 10 patients and 6 of these 10 patients had a relapse of seizures.
We thus propose that the immediate efficacy of CZP for RDs be accepted as a new characteristic of the EEG in BCECT. However, long term monotherapy with CZP for BCECT is not necessarily recommended because tolerance to this therapy would be expected to develop in the long run.
