Does familial Mediterranean fever affect cognitive function in children? Electrophysiological preliminary study

Objectives: Familial Mediterranean fever (FMF) is a periodic autoinflammatory disease with subclinical inflammation occurring between attacks. The aim of the study was to prospectively evaluate the cognitive function of children diagnosed with FMF that were under colchicine therapy and compare them with healthy controls through electrophysiologically event-related potentials (ERPs) study. Methods: Twelve children with FMF and 12 healthy controls were included in the study. During the electroencephalography recordings, all participants were instructed to discriminate rare stimuli (target stimuli) from frequent stimuli (standard stimuli) by pressing a botton on a mouse immediately following the target stimulus. P300, the cognitive component of ERP, was obtained in response to target stimuli and its amplitude and latency were measured. Results: The amplitude of the P300 of the FMF patients was higher and the latencies of the P300 of the FMF patients were shorter than the amplitudes and latencies of control patients, respectively. The difference between the groups was statistically significant for amplitude but not for latency. Conclusions: Cognitive processing reflecting allocation of attention and visual processing speed seems not to be negatively affected in FMF patients with homozygous M694V mutations undergoing colchicine treatment. As this study is unique in its evaluation of the cognitive function of children with FMF, these findings may be helpful for counseling families and patients affected by the condition.