The Psychoses of Epilepsy

Examines the relationship between epilepsy and mental illness. It describes the various manifestations of psychosis in epileptic patients, reviews the mechanisms for development of psychosis and offers practical advice on treatment. Aimed at epileptologists, neurologists, psychiatrists.

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Written by a specialist in behavioural neurology, this volume discusses the relationship between epilepsy and mental illness. The author describes the various manifestations of psychosis in epileptic patients, reviews the mechanisms for development of psychosis and offers practical advice on treatment. The differences between ictal and interictal psychoses are examined in detail and the different forms of interictal psychosis, including schizophrenia-like, manic-depressive, and paranoid, are discussed from both the theoretical and clinical point of view. Attention is given to risk factors for interictal psychoses, as well as to controversies with regard to personality change and psychosis as an interictal problem in epilepsy. The author also discusses the phenomenon of forced normalization and assesses the risk of postoperative psychoses after temporal lobectomy. Of special note is a clinical review of treatments for epilepsy and for ictal and interictal psychoses.
The author offers guidelines on the use of anticonvulsants in patients with psychotic conditions and the pharmacological treatment of psychoses in epileptic patients, as well as on the indications for electroconvulsive therapy. The final chapter analyzes the associations between seizures, temporal lobe abnormalities, and psychoses, especially in epileptic patients presenting with symptoms of schizophrenia.