FULL-LENGTH ORIGINAL RESEARCH

Accelerated long-term forgetting in children with idiopathic generalized epilepsy

  1. Michael B. Gascoigne1,
  2. Belinda Barton2,
  3. Richard Webster3,
  4. Deepak Gill3,
  5. Jayne Antony3,
  6. Suncica Sunny Lah1

Article first published online: 12 OCT 2012

DOI: 10.1111/j.1528-1167.2012.03719.x

Issue

Epilepsia

Epilepsia

Volume 53, Issue 12, pages 2135–2140, December 2012

Additional Information

How to Cite

Gascoigne, M. B., Barton, B., Webster, R., Gill, D., Antony, J. and Lah, S. S. (2012), Accelerated long-term forgetting in children with idiopathic generalized epilepsy. Epilepsia, 53: 2135–2140. doi: 10.1111/j.1528-1167.2012.03719.x

Author Information

  1. 1

    School of Psychology, and ARC Centre of Excellence in Cognition and its Disorders, The University of Sydney, Sydney, Australia

  2. 2

    CHERI, The Children’s Hospital at Westmead and Discipline of Paediatrics and Child Health, Faculty of Medicine, University of Sydney, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia

  3. 3

    T.Y. Nelson Department of Neurology and Neurosurgery, The Children’s Hospital at Westmead, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia

*Address correspondence to Suncica S. Lah, School of Psychology, University of Sydney, Sydney, NSW 2006, Australia. E-mail: suncica.lah@sydney.edu.au

Publication History

  1. Issue published online: 3 DEC 2012
  2. Article first published online: 12 OCT 2012
  3. Accepted August 21, 2012; Early View publication October 12, 2012.

SEARCH

SEARCH BY CITATION

ARTICLE TOOLS

View Full Article with Supporting Information (HTML) Get PDF (156K)

Keywords:

  • Idiopathic generalized epilepsy;
  • Accelerated forgetting;
  • Memory;
  • Recall;
  • Consolidation

Summary

Purpose:  The rapid forgetting of information over long (but not short) delays (accelerated long-term forgetting [ALF]) has been associated with temporal lobe epilepsy but not idiopathic generalized epilepsy (IGE). Long-term memory formation (consolidation) is thought to demand an interaction between medial temporal and neocortical networks, which could be disrupted by epilepsy/seizures themselves. The present study investigates whether ALF is present in children with IGE and whether it relates to epilepsy severity.

Methods:  Sixty-one children (20 with IGE and 41 healthy controls [HC]) of comparable age, sex, and parental socioeconomic status completed neuropsychological tests, including a measure of verbal learning and recall after, short (30-min) and long (7-day) delays, and recognition. Epilepsy severity was rated by treating neurologists.

Key Findings:  A two-way repeated measures analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) found a significant Group x Delay interaction; the children with IGE recalled (and recognized) significantly fewer words after a long, but not short (2- and 30-min) delay relative to the HC children. Moreover, greater epilepsy severity was associated with poorer recognition.

Significance:  This study demonstrates, to our knowledge for the first time, that children with IGE present with ALF, which is related to epilepsy severity. These findings support the notion that epilepsy/seizures themselves may disrupt long-term memory consolidation, which interferes with day-to-day functioning of children with IGE.

View Full Article with Supporting Information (HTML) Get PDF (156K)