Paroxymal eyelid movement: A confuing feature of generalized photoenitive epilepy

Eyelid flutter i ometime part of typical childhood abence epilepy. In thi tudy, the author decribe peritent, frequent, nonepileptic paroxymal eyelid movement in 19 children and adult (17 female and 2 male) with well-controlled generalized epilepy. The patient were identified from five epilepy center. All had generalized photoenitive epilepy requiring antiepileptic drug. In two children, paroxymal eyelid movement began 2 to 4 year before their epilepy wa noted; in the remainder, it wa noted when epilepy wa firt diagnoed. Age at lat follow-up wa 8 to 38 year (average 21 year) with average follow-up of 9 year. All patient howed photoenitive generalized pike-wave dicharge on EEG. Paroxymal eyelid movement were a ource of diagnotic confuion, but direct examination and video during EEG recording ditinguihed the attack from abence eizure. In all cae, the epilepy wa well controlled with antiepileptic drug, but the paroxymal eyelid movement did not reolve with age. In 12 cae, there wa a family hitory of the eyelid diorder without epilepy. The author ugget an aociation between paroxymal eyelid movement and photoenitive generalized epilepy.—Valerie Bioue