Post-COVID-19 Inflammatory Syndrome Manifesting As Refractory Status Epilepticus

Overview

Journal Epilepsia

Specialty Neurology

Date 2020 Sep 18

PMID 32944946

Citations 45

Authors

Elizabeth Carroll

Henry Neumann

Maria E Aguero-Rosenfeld

Jennifer Lighter

Barry M Czeisler

Kara Melmed

Ariane Lewis

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

There have been multiple descriptions of seizures during the acute infectious period in patients with COVID-19. However, there have been no reports of status epilepticus after recovery from COVID-19 infection. Herein, we discuss a patient with refractory status epilepticus 6 weeks after initial infection with COVID-19. Extensive workup demonstrated elevated inflammatory markers, recurrence of a positive nasopharyngeal SARS-CoV-2 polymerase chain reaction, and hippocampal atrophy. Postinfectious inflammation may have triggered refractory status epilepticus in a manner similar to the multisystemic inflammatory syndrome observed in children after COVID-19.

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