Interviewed expert/Chang Yanqun, chief physician of Children's Neurorehabilitation Department of Guangdong Maternal and Child Health Hospital

Article/Yangcheng Evening News reporter Chen Yingping Correspondent Lin Huifang

Many parents work hard and leave their children to the elderly. When they get together with their children during the Spring Festival, they find that their children are not right, for example, wooden and dull. At this time, you must ask why, or you can find the abnormal growth and development of children early and treat them in time.

　　 Some epilepsy is easily misdiagnosed as inattention

Five year old Jia Jia was always depressed when she returned to her mother during the holiday. When her mother asked her why, she said that it was her turn to jump several times when she played with her partners. When she ran to the rubber band, she stood there motionless and asked her partners to yell at her before responding. Now the partners are unwilling to play with her. Her mother hurried to take Jiajia to the neurology department of the hospital, and finally Jiajia was diagnosed with childhood absence seizures.

Chang Yanqun, chief physician of Children's Neurorehabilitation Department of Guangdong Maternal and Child Health Hospital, said that when it comes to epilepsy, many people will associate with common symptoms such as sudden falls, choking, limbs rigidity, convulsions or foaming at the mouth. In fact, the seizure forms of children's epilepsy are various, and one of them is easily ignored by people, called epilepsy absence seizure. The onset age of children with epilepsy absence seizures is about 3-12 years old, and the peak age is 5-7 years old. Because the disease is not obvious and the duration of the attack is short, it is often ignored by parents or teachers, and even misdiagnosed by doctors.

The main manifestations of children's epileptic absence seizures are sudden loss of consciousness, sudden stop of ongoing autonomous activities and language, staring eyes, empty eyes, and dull expression, but generally do not fall or drop objects. After the attack lasts for several seconds to tens of seconds, the patient's consciousness suddenly recovers and can continue the previous action, but often can't recall the attack just experienced.

As children's absence seizures are not obvious and last for a short time, they are often not noticed by parents or teachers. Sometimes, even if it is found, it is easy to be mistaken for children's inattention and daze when learning, and criticize it as a bad problem, which virtually increases the psychological burden of children. Seizures of absence sometimes occur dozens or even hundreds of times a day. Without timely and effective treatment, some children can change from absence seizures to tonic clonic seizures after puberty.

　　 "EEG+evoked test" can definitely diagnose

Chang Yanqun said that parents should pay more attention to the child's subtle abnormal performance at ordinary times. If the child is often absent-minded, especially when it is difficult to wake up easily by shouting or gesturing, they should be highly vigilant, take the child to a special hospital in time, and do EEG examination to make a clear diagnosis. At present, "hyperventilation induction test" is the most effective induction test for epileptic absence seizures. If children can complete hyperventilation in sufficient depth, they can generally induce typical EEG and clinical seizures.

Other predisposing factors of childhood absence epilepsy include emotional factors and intellectual factors. Emotional factors (including anger, sadness, fear, surprise, embarrassment), intellectual factors (including lack of interest, inattention), meal or class time, hypoglycemia, etc. It is necessary to find out the cause of epilepsy in children and avoid it.

Generally, one drug can control 80% of children's absence seizures, but improper drug selection will worsen the seizures and even cause status epilepticus. Therefore, careful diagnosis must be made before using the drug. Generally speaking, for simple absence attacks, the drug can be gradually stopped about 3 years after the attack stops.