Dr. Bladimir Zambrano

ASSOCIATION BETWEEN PEDIATRIC TRAUMATIC BRAIN INJURY AND EPILEPSY AT LATER AGES

This Finnish, nationwide, retrospective, cohort study conducted from 1998 to 2018 involving 71,969 pediatric patients hospitalized with traumatic brain injury (TBI) and a control group of 64,856 patients with distal extremity fractures investigated the correlation between pediatric TBI (pTBI) and the development of epilepsy at later ages. The cumulative incidence rates of and hazard ratio (HR) for developing epilepsy were higher in the pTBI group. The hazard ratio was particularly high in the first 2 years after injury (HR, 4.38) and remained elevated between years 2 and 20. Children who underwent neurosurgery for TBI had a substantially higher risk of developing epilepsy, with the risk being highest in the first 4 years after injury (HR, 14.37).
Although these results are intuitive, the quantification of the risk factor for developing epilepsy in patients with pTBI, especially the identification of a higher risk period of the first 4 years after injury, is important.