Status Epilepticus in Children

Abstract

Status epilepticus (SE) is an acute, one of the most common, life threatening emergency condition in children and adolescence. According to the ILAE commission, SE is defined as a condition resulting either from the failure of the mechanisms responsible for seizure termination or from the initiation of mechanisms, which lead to abnormally, prolonged seizures. Regarding duration, ILAE defines convulsive SE as bilateral tonic–clonic lasting longer that 5 minutes, and absence and focal status epilepticus as exceeding 10 minutes. Children compared to adults are more prone to epileptic seizures and as a consequence to SE, mainly due to age related maturational imbalance between excitatory and inhibitory synaptic mechanisms. The classification into generalised or focal, convulsive and nonconvulsive differ widely in aetiology, management and outcome. Early prehospital intervention with appropriate protective measures and emergency medication of seizure disorder, may prevent perpetuation of seizure recurrence. If first line treatment fails and or event, emergency hospital admission should be provided for more aggressive intravenous therapy, assessment-support.