European Journal of Cardiovascular Medicine

Introduction- Acute symptomatic seizures(ASS) are commonly encountered in clinical practice. ASS are defined as seizures occurring in close temporal relationship with an acute medical or neurological injury which can be metabolic, toxic, vascular, structural, infectious or inflammatory. This study was done with the aim to determine  the clinical and etiological profile of new onset, non traumatic ASS. Materials & Methods- This is a hospital based cross- sectional study done for a period of 1 year, with a sample size of 86 patients. We included adult patients who were admitted with first episode of seizure or for other medical conditions who developed seizure during hospital stay and excluded hyperventilation, TIA, pseudo seizures, movement disorders, eclampsia, known epileptic disorder taking antiepileptic drugs and head injury. Data was collected using preformed porforma. Study participants were evaluated by thorough history taking, clinical examination, laboratory investigations, EEG, CT brain and MRI brain wherever indicated. Results- Our study enrolled a total of 86 patients with majority of cases in the age group of 21- 40 years, with a overall male:female ratio being 1.6:1. GTCS was the most common seizure type (60.4%), focal seizure was present in 10.4%. Status epilepticus was seen in 12.79%. Majority were due to metabolic and toxic causes (39.5%), followed by CNS infections (24.4%), CVA (22.1%), tumours (5.8%) and CVT (2.3%). CNS infections accounted for majority of cases of ASS in young and  metabolic causes predominated in middle aged and elderly populations. Among metabolic, majority (32.3%) patients presented with alcohol withdrawal/ intoxication induced seizures. Conclusion ASS is found to have a male preponderance occuring more commonly in 21-40 years with majority presenting with GTCS with most commonly metabolic etiology followed by CNS infections.