Surgical removal of front part of left temporal lobe

[RethaCollett]

My 5 year old son has been diagnosed with temporal lobe epilepsy.  He has a severe case of meningitis at 16 months and his doctor believes that this caused the damage to his brain.  On the MRI scan you can clearly see the damage to the front part of the left temporal lobe.  He is on Epilim at the moment but not seizure free yet, although the seizures are much less.  We are considering surgery.  We are unsure of the successrate of this procedure and would like more information, for example, can the operation cause more brain damage, and can it alter his personality?

[Abhijeet Deshmukh, MD]

Hello.

Before you go for the surgery, make sure that focus of epilepsy is the temporal lobe only. If some other focus has developed, the surgery may not help eliminate seizures completely.

There may be some changes in the behavior. He may have more anger outbursts. But these are uncommon. The main seat of personality is in the frontal lobes. Hence, his personality will not change with this surgery.

I hope this helps. You may post any further queries if you have.

Regards

[Keychs]

Hi:) I am actually searching out others in my area, Portsmouth NH, who have had the temporal lobectamy, as I HAVE!!! I am 4 months post surgery, and my experiance is a 27 year old with uncontrolled right temporal lobe epilepsy for 14 years having been on every combination of meds out there, I still continued on my days with complex partial seizures even on 4500mg of meds per day, so that is why I was put through complex testing to localize where the epilepsy was coming from, they focalized it and resected it out, and Ive been now 4mnths with 1 seizure and many auras, all of which have gone! That is coming from a girl who had at least a partial seizure a day! Post surgery has been a storm to weather, moods, my whole  chemistry was changed and I had 2 surgeries w/in 3weeks, so with all post surgery chaos, Im looking at getting my liscence back of which Ive been without for years, 4 months and no seizure Ill have that independance back along with babysitting my 1yrold nephew alone-sorry that is part of my life story but this surgery along with Dartmouth Medical Hospital may have given me that piece of freedom back! Yes, post surgery can be difficult but from experiance a great hospital/neurologist the good far out weigh the bad:) Take care, any further ?'s feel free to ask, really.
Keycho
Porstmouth,NH

[RethaCollett]

Thanks so much for your message!

[RethaCollett]

Have you ever tried the ketogenic diet for epilepsy?  Everyone is putting pressure on me to put my son onto this diet.  It's no easy diet though.  How do you explain to a 5-year old that he can't eat the same food as his brother?

[Dana1968]

I had surgery on the right temporal lobe for epilepsy in 1993!  At the time I was 24.  before surgery I had complex partial seizures, never totally controlled by medication.  I was in numerous drug studies at Vanderbilt, and post surgery and only taking 50 mg of Topamax, one the drug of which I was in a study for!  I have a breakthrough aura now and then, but as long as I take my medicine, no seizures.  I have tried a few times to go off the medication, under Dr's care, but I would have stronger auras and even a breakthrough seizure.  I can say that it truly gave me my life back.  I have since had two children, and went back to college again and finished out my second degree and have been working since.  It's great to be seizure free and not dependent on everyone else.  

[RethaCollett]

Hi
Thanks for your message.  Every bit helps!  It's quite a thing to decide on behalf of your 5 year old son if he should get brain surgery or not.
Do I understand you correctly that you have to stay on the medication after the operation?  I just need to make sure.
Thanks!