Refractory chronic epilepsy associated with neuronal auto-antibodies: could perisylvian semiology be a clue?

Abstract

Aims. We report a case series of 10 patients with chronic medically refractory antibody-positive autoimmune epilepsy and assess their common clinical features. Immune-mediated seizures are most commonly reported in the context of encephalitis or encephalopathy, with few reports focusing on lone, chronic epilepsy in the outpatient setting. Our aim was to define the potential diagnostic clues that might be present in these cases, leading to consideration of an autoimmune cause of the epilepsy