Comorbid Diseases in Patients With Epilepsy

Objective: The purpose of the study was to evaluate the frequency of comorbid diseases in our patients with epilepsy and to determine the relationship between these comorbidities and demographic, clinical and radiological findings. Methods: We analyzed 365 patients who were followed up in our epilepsy outpatient clinic between 2011 and 2014, retrospectively. Demographic and clinical findings of the patients, neurological, psychiatric and systemic comorbid diseases were recorded. The association of comorbid diseases with age, gender, type of epilepsy syndromes and radiological findings were evaluated. Results: The most common comorbid diseases in our patients were psychiatric disorders (21.1%) and headache (11.2%) and they were followed by hypertension, thyroid diseases, anemia, gastrointestinal diseases, coronary artery disease, diabetes mellitus, hyperlipidemia, asthma, genito-urinary diseases, cerebrovascular disease and cancer. Anxiety disorders and depression were the most common psychiatric comorbidities. Migraine was more common than tension-type headache. Mean age of the patients having hypertension, hyperlipidemia, coronary artery disease, cerebrovascular diseases and diabetes mellitus were significantly older than the patients having other comorbid diseases. Women had greater tendency to have psychiatric diseases, thyroid diseases, headache and anemia than men. Patients with symptomatic and cryptogenic epilepsies had psychiatric diseases, hypertension and thyroid diseases more frequently than the patients having idiopathic epilepsy syndromes. Conclusion: A wide variety of psychiatric, neurological and systemic disorders may accompany epilepsy. The diagnosis and treatment of comorbid diseases are necessary for the improvement of life qualities of epilepsy patients. Identifying and treating these comorbidities in patients epilepsy is as important as seizure treatment.