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Chronic (Rasmussen’s) Encephalitis in an Adult

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 December 2014

Richard Wennberg ,
Sukriti Nag ,
Mary-Pat McAndrews ,
Andres M. Lozano ,
Richard Farb  and
David Mikulis
Richard Wennberg
Affiliation:
Division of Neurology, Krembil Neuroscience Centre, Toronto, Western Hospital, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada
Sukriti Nag
Affiliation:
Neuropathology, Krembil Neuroscience Centre, Toronto, Western Hospital, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada
Mary-Pat McAndrews
Affiliation:
Neuropsychology, Krembil Neuroscience Centre, Toronto, Western Hospital, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada
Andres M. Lozano
Affiliation:
Neurosurgery, Krembil Neuroscience Centre, Toronto, Western Hospital, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada
Richard Farb
Affiliation:
Neuroradiology, Krembil Neuroscience Centre, Toronto, Western Hospital, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada
David Mikulis
Affiliation:
Neuroradiology, Krembil Neuroscience Centre, Toronto, Western Hospital, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada
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A 24-year-old woman was referred because of incompletely-controlled complex partial seizures. Her seizures had started at age 21, after a mild head injury with brief loss of consciousness incurred in a biking accident, and were characterized by a sensation of bright flashing lights in the right visual field, followed by numbness and tingling in the right foot, spreading up the leg and to the arm, ultimately involving the entire right side, including the face. Occasionally they spread further to involve right facial twitching with jerking of the right arm and leg, loss of awareness and, at the onset of her epilepsy, rare secondarily generalized convulsions. Seizure frequency averaged three to four per month. She was initially treated with phenytoin and clobazam and subsequently changed to carbamazepine 800 milligrams per day. She also complained that her right side was no longer as strong as her left and that it was also numb, especially the leg, but felt that this weakness had stabilized or improved slightly over the past two years.

Type
Research Article
Information
Canadian Journal of Neurological Sciences , Volume 30 , Issue 3 , August 2003 , pp. 263 - 265
Copyright
Copyright © The Canadian Journal of Neurological 2003

References

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