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A review of 36 interictal EEGs compatible with the diagnosis of benign childhood epilepsy with centro-temporal spikes (BECTS) was made in this study. These children constituted 31% of the children with focal epileptic EEG activity observed in the same period. The dipolic spikes occurred either as a single focus (78%) or as two independent foci with a greater preponderance to the right (22%). The onset of seizures before the age of 5 years (Group I) is 53% and between 6 and 10 years (Group II) is 47%. Clinical evaluation showed that 60% of the patients in Group I and 75% in Group II had lateralized seizures, although all of them were initially diagnosed as nocturnal generalized tonic-clonic seizures. A follow-up study showed 31% complete recovery, 47% seizure-free under medications, 8% occasional seizures, 8% frequent seizures, and the rest 6% had a single seizure without medication. It is therefore concluded that the syndrome is common in Saudi Arabia and is usually unrecognized by the general physicians. The follow-up of our patients so far confirms the excellent prognosis.

We evaluated the clinical characteristics and the electroencephalographic (EEG) findings by long video-EEG monitoring in 64 successive patients with definite nocturnal seizures. Mental state, neurological examination, neuroimaging and EEG background were normal in all patients. Classification of epilepsies was possible in 42 out of 64 (66%) patients according to the revised Classification of Epilepsies and Epileptic Syndromes by the Commission on Classification and Terminology of International League Against Epilepsy (1989). Out of those 42 patients, 33 (79%) had partial epilepsies, while 9 (21%) had generalized epilepsies. Response to antiepileptic drugs was excellent and only 4 (6%) patients had one seizure attack per year, two of them were on two antiepileptic drugs while the others were free of seizure on a single drug during the 2 years of follow-up. It seems that nocturnal seizures in adults form a new distinctive partial epileptic syndrome of a benign entity.

Evoked potential audiometry and brain-stem auditory evoked potentials were evaluated in 15 patients with systemic brucellosis in whom brucella meningitis was suspected clinically. In 8 patients cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) was abnormal with high brucella titre, and evoked potentials were abnormal in all of them. In 7 patients the CSF was normal and evoked potentials were also normal. Brain-stem auditory evoked potential abnormalities were categorised into 4 types: (1) abnormal wave I, (2) abnormal wave V, both irreversible, (3) prolonged I-III interpeak latencies, and (4) prolonged I-V interpeak latencies, both reversible. These findings are of important diagnostic value and correlate well with the clinical features, aetiopathogenesis and final outcome.