Abstracts

Rationale: This study investigated the influence of epilepsy on the level of adaptive function, emotional and behavioral problems, and quality of life in children and adolescents with epilepsy. Methods: A clinician rating and parent-report scales were administered to 594 children and adolescents(boys=372, girls=251), aged 1 to 18 years. Parents provided behavioral, emotional and adaptive information on each clinician rating index and behavior checklist. Results: While developmental quotient had a tendency of negative correlation with age, adaptive functions showed improvement as getting older. On behavioral and emotional domains, academic and social competence had the lowest score but also had a tendency of improvement by growing, on the other hand, withdrawn was getting worse by growing up, especially in girls group. Over all age, the quality of life relatively belonged to quite good level of satisfactions, excepting cognitive and social functions such as concentration, memory, language, social activities and social interactions, showing better satisfactions by aging. Generally in the oldest group, adaptive functions and quality of life showed the highest scores, and the lowest behavioral and emotional problems, despite negative correlations of development level and age. Children with epileptic encephalopathy, multiple AEDs, and/or medical intractability showed relationship with abnormal behaviors. Conclusions: Children with epilepsy in younger age were shown to have more vulnerability to behavioral, emotional and adaptive problems. Cognitive and social function were the most lasting problems of children and adolescents with epilepsy.