Epilepsy, Psychogenic Seizure, Trauma in the Developmental Process

Abstract

An epileptic seizure, can cause trauma for its sudden emergence, leading to functional impairment, accidents and injuries, and fear of death. The seizure can be traumatizing itself, besides, an head trauma that may occur during the seizure can also cause epilepsy. As the severity and duration of epilepsy increases, disturbances in development and traumatic effects occur. Conversion (psychogenic) seizures may be added over the years in epileptic patients. The comorbidity of trauma-related dissociative disorder and psychogenic seizures is observed in approximately half of the cases. Dissociative disorders are known to occur in children with chronic diseases due to the traumatic effect of the disease. Conversion disorder and psychogenic seizures are frequently seen in dissociative disorders. Posttraumatic stress disorder, dissociative disorders, and psychogenic seizures are often comorbid diagnoses in epilepsy. For this reason, traumatic effect and associated dissociative disorder dimension should be kept in mind in the psychiatric approach when handling with cases of epilepsy.

Keywords: Epilepsy; development; dissociative disorder; posttraumatic stress disorder; trauma.