Abstracts

Rationale: Differentiating epileptic and non-epileptic seizure patients is a complex diagnostic issue, and accurate diagnosis has implications for medical and mental health treatment. Neuropsychological evaluation, including objective assessment of personality and psychopathology, may help to identify patients with NES. The present study investigates the psychological profiles commonly associated with NES and ES using the Personality Assessment Inventory. Methods: Patients were classified into two groups based on review by an epileptologist of the events captured by VEEG (ES = 132, NES = 31). All patients were administered the PAI as part of a comprehensive neuropsychological test battery. Nine patients were excluded due to invalid PAI profiles. Results: Most clinical scales were in the normal range; however, NES scores were significantly higher in several domains. Oneway ANOVA indicated significant differences between groups on the Somatic Complaints scale and its subscales, Conversion and Somatization (p < .001) with the NES group having higher scores. This pattern was also found on the Depression scale and its subscales, Physiological and Affective (p < .001). Stepwise logistic regression revealed the Conversion and Somatization subscales had the strongest significant relationship with diagnosis (p < .01). Conclusions: While patients with epilepsy may report higher levels of health concerns, anxiety, and depression than the general population, NES patients report significantly more symptoms in these areas. Elevated health concerns and somatization were the greatest predictors distinguishing the groups. Additional validation against other diagnostic groups is needed to determine the specificity of this PAI profile for NES.