Purpose: To determine if, and how, epileptiform EEG discharges in children were influenced by physical exercise.
Methods: Twenty-six children with intractable partial and generalized epilepsy exercised during video-telemetry recording, aiming at exhaustion after approximately 10 min.
Results: During the exercise, epileptiform discharges decreased in 20 of 26 children (17 children had at least 25% reduction) and showed a rebound increase after the exercise (17 of 26 children) compared to baseline conditions. This exercise-induced reduction in epileptiform discharges reached statistical significance only in the 16 patients with localization-related epilepsy. Five patients showed an atypical EEG response to exercise with either unchanged or increased epileptiform activity while exercising. As compared to the other patients, these 5 children had experienced frequent clinical seizures during or immediately after exercise in their leisure time.
Conclusions: In the majority of the tested children, epileptiform EEG discharges decreased during exercise. "Exercise-EEG" may be a helpful diagnostic tool to identify patients who are disposed to have exercise-induced seizures.