Thalamic atrophy in childhood absence epilepsy

Abstract

Purpose: Patients with childhood absence epilepsy (CAE) have normal clinical magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) studies. The presence of abnormalities in corticothalamic networks has been suggested to be the functional basis of absence seizure generation. We assessed whether structural grey and white matter volume changes of these areas occurred in patients with absence seizures by using optimized voxel-based morphometry (VBM). Methods: We recruited 13 patients with a clinical and EEG diagnosis of CAE (mean age at examination, 17 ± 8 years) and compared them with a consecutive series of 109 controls (mean age, 29 ± 9 years). The 3 tesla MRI examination included a 3D T 1-weighted sequence, whic..