Epileptiform discharges and epilepsy in non-syndromic ASD patients. Pre, peri, post-natal risk factors for epilepsy.

Objectives: Current literature reports co-occurrence of ASD and epilepsy in 20-40% and epileptiform discharges in 13-40%. Our purpose is to evaluate the risk of epileptiform discharges in children with ASD.

Methods: 273 children with ASD were included in this study. The diagnosis of ASD was made according with ICD-10 criteria and using specific ASD tests (ADOS, ADI-R). All children have undergone clinical, neurological, psychiatric evaluation and detailed history regarding pre, peri, postnatal events was obtained. EEG studies were performed. The presence of epileptiform discharges was analyzed in correlation with different prenatal, perinatal and postnatal risk factors, including infections, hypoxic-ischemic events, C-section, Apgar score, psychomotor delay/regress. For data analysis we used IBM SPSS22 software by applying Chi2 for association.

Results: 13,55% of ASD children had epileptiform discharges, and 9,52% presented epileptic seizures. The most frequent risk factors associated with epileptiform discharges/epilepsy were: C-section (45.94%), psychomotor delay or regress (43,24%), and brain malformations (10,81%). Significant statistical correlation was established between the diagnosis of epilepsy and C-section (X2=0.175, p=0.042), motor delay (X2=0.93, p=0.047) and regress (X2=5.45, p=0.035).

Conclusion: Children with ASD have a higher prevalence of epileptiform discharges and epilepsy than general population. Epileptiform discharges alone in ASD are not a high-risk factor. An important prevalence of C-section, motor delay and regress were observed.

Acknowledgment: The research leading to these results has received funding from the EEA RO NO Grant 2014-2021, under the project contract No 6/2019
Keywords: autism, epilepsy, risk factors, epileptiform discharges