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Brain Advance Access published online on September 15, 2004
Brain, doi:10.1093/brain/awh267
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Received January 22, 2004
Revised June 14, 2004
Accepted June 14, 2004

Article

Life expectancy in people with newly diagnosed epilepsy

Athanasios Gaitatzis 1, Anthony L. Johnson 2, David W. Chadwick 3, Simon D. Shorvon 4, and Josemir W. Sander 5*

1 Department of Clinical and Experimental Epilepsy, Institute of Neurology, University College London, UK; Neuroepidemiology Unit, University College London Hospitals NHS Trust, London, UK
2 MRC Biostatistics Unit, Institute of Public Health, University Forvie Site, Cambridge, UK
3 University Department of Neuroscience, Walton Centre for Neurology and Neurosurgery, Liverpool, UK
4 Department of Clinical and Experimental Epilepsy, Institute of Neurology, University College London, London, UK
5 Department of Clinical and Experimental Epilepsy, Institute of Neurology, University College London, London, UK; Neuroepidemiology Unit, University College London Hospitals NHS Trust, London, UK

* To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: lsander{at}ion.ucl.ac.uk.


  Abstract

Epilepsy carries a risk of premature mortality, but little is known about life expectancy in people with the condition. The UK National General Practice Study of Epilepsy is a prospective, population-based study of people with newly diagnosed epilepsy. A cohort of 564 patients with definite epilepsy has been followed for nearly 15 years and there have been 177 deaths. These data have been used to estimate life expectancy of people in this cohort by employing a parametric survival model based on the Weibull distribution. Life expectancy in people with epilepsy was estimated as a function of age at, and time from, diagnosis according to two broad aetiological groups. These estimates were then compared with life expectancy in people of the same age and sex in the general population. Reduction in life expectancy can be up to 2 years for people with a diagnosis of idiopathic/cryptogenic epilepsy, and the reduction can be up to 10 years in people with symptomatic epilepsy. Reductions in life expectancy are highest at the time of diagnosis and diminish with time. Our model provides broad estimates, but it appears that the higher mortality rates in people with newly diagnosed epilepsy translate into decreased life expectancy.

Keywords: life expectancy; epilepsy; mortality; survival model.
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