[Clinical-radiological evaluation of infantile autism and epileptic syndromes associated with autism]

Abstract

With the aim of ascertaining the existence of medical conditions associated with autism, the presence of pre- and perinatal factors, family antecedents as well as the prevalence rate of different epileptic syndromes in the juvenile autistic population, we carried out a retrospective observational study and looked at the medical history of 62 autistic children so diagnosed in the neuropaediatric service at Barakaldo Hospital Cruces in the past twenty years. All of them were diagnosed by a child neurologist following DSM-III-R criteria, having been by the same physician on at least one occasion. From the etiologic point of view, eight children (13%) presented specific syndromes, fifteen (23%) presented encephalopathies acquired pre-or perinatally, two (3.2%) had brain tumours and the remaining thirty-seven (61%) presented critogenetic autism. 47% of autistic children were seen to have some kind of epileptic syndrome: six had idiopathic epilepsy (juvenile myoclonic epilepsy 1: partial benign epilepsy with Rolandic point 2 ; petit mal 1; generalised primary epilepsy grand mal type 1); eleven had cryptogenic epilepsy (myoclonic epilepsy 1 ; focal 7; grand mal 1; Lennox 2) and secondary epilepsy in eleven other cases (West 4; focal 6; grand mal). In the literature an epileptic frequency among autistic subjects is quoted as being between 16% and 35% dropping to 6% in slight cryptogenic autistic cases. Our frequency rate among autistic children is much higher, reaching 47% of the total and affecting 46% of cryptogenic autistic cases. There were no cases of polymorphic nursing epilepsy in our series. Idiopathic and cryptogenic epilepsy were more frequent in cryptogenic autism.