Two analyses from the Pediatric Epilepsy Research Consortium study in children with infantile spasms have been reported.1 In the first monotherapy analysis, cessation of spasms in 2 weeks of therapy, with resolution of hypsarrhythmia sustained at 3 months was achieved by a higher percentage of children who were treated with steroids compared with vigabatrin.1 However, when used as the second monotherapy, the responses were similar for the two treatments.1
In children with absence seizures, freedom from failure at 12 months was achieved by similar percentages of participants with ethosuximide and valproate when used as first monotherapy in a blinded study.1 However, the percentage of participants achieving this endpoint was approximately 50% lower with lamotrigine.1 A similar pattern was observed when these treatments were used as second monotherapies in an open-label study.1 However, rates of freedom from failure were consistently higher in all groups at 16‒20 weeks than at 12 months.1
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