Surgical management of intractable epilepsy

Cortical resective surgery (including amygdalohippocampectomy) and corpus callosotomy are the most widely accepted modes of surgical treatment for intractable epilepsy. Between July 1989 and May 1996, 146 surgeries for epilepsy were done at Severance Hospital, Yonsei University. Resective surgery was performed in 126 patients and corpus callosotomy in 20 patients. Of the 126 patients who underwent resective surgery, surgery for the removal of the epileptic lesion (lesionectomy) was performed in 21 patients (16.7%) while 105 patients (83.3%) underwent surgery without a structural lesion. Current surgical therapy for intractable epilepsy requires the precise localization of a resectable zone of epileptogenesis. Unfortunately, finding a localized focus in an extratemporal region is far more difficult than in the temporal lobe. Surgeries for extratemporal lobe epilepsy without lesions have been less successful than surgeries for temporal lobe epilepsy. Although surgery for intractable epilepsy has been increasingly successful, we still need to refine our techniques to further improve the success rate and to reduce complications of surgery such as language and memory impairment.