Abstract
Objective: To assess memory performance and the effect of temporal lobe resection in the treatment of patients with medically refractory epilepsy. Participants and Methods: 156 MTLE patients completed a one-year neuropsychological assessment.
Seventy-seven patients were treated on the left side, seventy-nine on the right side. We compared Global, Verbal and Visual Memory Quotients (MQ), Attention/Concentration and Delayed Recall by WMS-R before the temporal lobe resection and one year after the intervention.
All patients underwent standard preoperative neurological and neuropsychological evaluation, including the WADA test. Results: Using paired t-test, we didn't identify any significant changes in memory performance one year after the surgery in Global MQ (p= 0.377), Verbal MQ (p= 0.19), Visual MQ (p= 0.436245), Attention/Concentration (p= 0,07) and Delayed Recall (p= 0.244).
Conclusion: Epilepsy surgery is a widely respected therapeutic option for drug-resistant TLE patients. We found no memory deficit after temporal lobe resection in our group of patients.
We can conclude that temporal resection is a relatively safe intervention for refractory epilepsy with no significant impact on memory performance.