Title : Personality disorders in patients with idiopathic generalized epilepsy
Abstract:
Purpose: To estimate the prevalence of personality disorders in persons with idiopathic generalized epilepsy (IGE) and to compare it with the general population.
Method: The study was conducted in a super specialty epilepsy care center in a tertiary care hospital in South India. Study population included 57 normal control and 57 cases ((≥18 years of age, confirmed cases of IGE). Exclusion criteria included history of any psychiatric disorder, or family history of any psychiatric illness. Self-administered questionnaire was used for study data collection. IPDE-ICD10 screening questionnaire was applied to investigate personality traits and Bear-Fedio inventory (BFI) was used to study different behaviour traits in patients with IGE and controls. To compare the prevalence of personality disorders in cases and controls we applied Chi Square test. For ascertaining the relation between different demographic variables with the presence of personality disorders, Pearsons Chi Square test and Fischer exact test was applied. Mann Whitney U test was used to analyse the significant difference of Bear-Fedio inventory (BFI) scores between cases and controls.
Results: Comparing with controls, a higher prevalence of personality disorders was noted among idiopathic generalised epilepsy patients (87.72% in cases versus 36.84% in controls). Personality traits like borderline(p=0.000), anankastic(p=0.000), anxious(p=0.000), histrionic(p=0.000), paranoid(p=0.098), and impulsive(p=0.002) were considerably higher in cases with IGE. This was comparatively higher among females(p=0.034) than males. In BFI also significantly higher scores were found among cases in all behavioural traits except hyper moralism, altered sexual and aggression.
Conclusion: Personality disorders was significantly higher in cases with IGE.
Audience Take Away Notes:
- Audience will benefit from understanding the importance of psychiatric assessment in epilepsy
- This research is a flag bearer with respect to providing some knowledge with regard to personality disorders in idiopathic generalized epilepsy
- Without addressing the comorbid issues, no disease can be properly managed, hence this study will help in increasing the efficiency with regard to management of persons living with epilepsy (PWE)
