What to expect: mesial temporal sclerosis?

Welcome to the Coping With Epilepsy Forums

Welcome to the Coping With Epilepsy forums - a peer support community for folks dealing (directly or indirectly) with seizure disorders. You can visit the forum page to see the list of forum nodes (categories/rooms) for topics.

Please have a look around and if you like what you see, please consider registering an account and joining the discussions. When you register an account and log in, you may enjoy additional benefits including no ads, access to members only (ie. private) forum nodes and more. Registering an account is free - you have nothing to lose!

Ophelina

Ophelina

New
Messages
22
Reaction score
0
Points
0
Hi guys,

A lot has happened since I wrote here last time. I was put on Keppra in March/April and was visiting my neuro on a regular basis.

She requested another MRI scan, because my last one was dating from 2006 when I was first diagnosed.
According to her I have complex partials, which have improved since I've started Keppra, but she upped my dose to 2500mg and added 5mg Diazepam (at night when needed), because I have some weird jaw clenching and trembling "seizures" that last throughout the whole night and keep waking me up.

Fast forward to November: my MRI showed reduced volume of right anterior hippocampus (hippocampal atrophy?) with an enlargement of temporal horn - mesial temporal sclerosis.

My neuro hasn't seen the results yet, so I was wandering what could I expect? What's your experience with this diagnose? Could there be any other underlying cause? Did you also test for some other diseases? If so, which ones?

I have to mention, that I was never diagnosed with TLE, because my seizures have a tendency to generalize and don't have a clearly defined focus (origination point) as seen on EEG. This was confirmed by all my neuros.
Also, the mesial temporal sclerosis thing wasn't caught on an MRI scan I did 10 years ago - only mild hemispheric asymmetry.

Thanks for all the answers in advance!
:e:
 
Ophelina,

I have mesial temporal sclerosis and I had the laser ablation surgery last year. I saw my MRI before the surgery. My left Hippocampus was about half the size of my right Hippocampus so I would say it shrunk about 50%. It's probably from living with seizures for many years and explains my memory issues that began when I was about 40 yeas old. I have complex partials. None so far since the surgery almost 18 months ago. I've only had auras since the surgery. My left Hippocampus and Amygdala were removed. I believe mesial temporal sclerosis is common with temporal lobe epilepsy.
 
Last edited:
Ophelina - if you haven't seen the neurologist yet, who made the new diagnosis?

If you happen to be looking at a copy of the radiologist's report, it is easy to misdiagnose or overdiagnose ourselves because a radiologist simply reports his/her observations. If s/he reports seeing x, y and z for instance, it doesn't mean a particular condition is present in a diagnostically significant way.

If a neurologist besides your own is interpreting the findings, that's a different matter as s/he can more accurately integrate the findings and determine what is going on, but I would suggest hanging in there, and waiting for your own neurologist to handle things.
 
@Music36
Thank you for your answer. Nice to hear you are doing fine now.

@masterjen
Not a radiologist. A neurologist who's not my own, but is informed about my medical history and has seen all the findings from my previous neurologists.
I do plan to see my own neurologist soon and in the meantime I was just wandering what to expect.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom