These are broadly reflected in the current product information (the Summary of Product Characteristics for healthcare professionals and the Patient Information Leaflet). With regards to risk of specific malformations, the available data suggest an increased risk of oral cleft lip or palate, hypospadias and atrial septal defect in association with topiramate. While the evidence to support an increased risk of major congenital malformations is not consistent across all studies, those that do not suggest an increased risk tend to be studies with a smaller number of pregnancies exposed to topiramate.
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It’s what happens if you live close to a hospital and start to blank out the sound of sirens, for example. It’s important because it means that organisms don’t waste time and energy by responding to stimuli that do not pose a danger to them. The cerebellum is a leaf-shaped structure found towards the back of the brain. Things like learning to ride a bike or the movement involved in writing will involve a large input from the cerebellum. Below the cerebrum is a structure called the hypothalamus, which is involved in homeostatic responses such as maintaining body temperature (thermoregulation). It also produces hormones that control the pituitary gland, which is found just beneath the hypothalamus.
Major congenital malformations
This is because untreated epilepsy can cause harm to both the mother and her unborn baby. The pioneering work of Howard Gardner and Daniel Goleman’s book Emotional Intelligence have hopefully finally debunked the idea cerebrumiq that we all possess a single innate intelligence or “IQ”. Gardner emphasises that we all have at least seven intelligences and each can be improved with practise. The “intelligences” are Logical/Mathematical, Linguistic, Physical /Kinesthetic, Musical, Visual/Spatial, Intrapersonal, and Interpersonal. The Logical/Mathematical relates to our ability to reason and calculate and is most developed in scientists, mathematicians, lawyers and judges. The Linguistic intelligence is our ability to read, write and communicate with words.
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- The purpose of this term is to help target support, as people who do not have visual impairments will benefit from a different teaching and support approach to those who do.
- The period of early life when our brains are developing is called the critical period.
- Currently, valproate should not be used in girls (of any age) and women of childbearing potential unless there is no suitable alternative, as judged by a specialist experienced in the management of epilepsy or bipolar disorder.
- Two recent Reddit discussions – both centered around CerebrumIQ results – highlight how a seemingly simple test score can lead to complex self-reflection, especially when it intersects with profession or identity.
- Although you cannot use CT scanners to work out the function of different brain regions directly, you can infer the functions of different brain regions by matching a patient’s symptoms with areas of brain damage.
Residual confounding occurs when a risk factor has not been adequately adjusted for in the statistical analysis. The consequence is that the estimated association is not the same as the true effect. A value greater than 1 suggests an increased risk; a value equal to 1 suggests an equal risk; and a value less than one suggests a decreased risk. Physical defects present in a baby at birth that have significant medical, social or cosmetic consequences for the affected individual, and typically require medical intervention.
Phenobarbital is indicated for the treatment and control of all forms of epilepsy, except absence seizures. However, it should only be used in the treatment of febrile convulsions in exceptional circumstances. NICE guidance recommends that oxcarbazepine can be used first line for generalised tonic-clonic seizures and also as first line and adjunctive treatment for focal seizures.
- The visual cortex is a region at the back of our brains and forms part of the cerebral cortex.
- Antidepressants have been developed to increase the levels of brain serotonin.
- A physical defect present in a baby at birth that can involve many different parts of the body, including the brain, heart, lungs, liver, bones, and intestinal tract.
- For completeness, clinical data in relation to a number of other antiepileptic drugs less commonly used in the UK has also been reviewed; these include brivaracetam, clobazam, clonazepam, eslicarbazepine, ethosuximide, lacosamide, perampanel, primidone, rufinamide, tiagabine and vigabatrin.
- Based on the pooled data from this study the prevalence of major malformations (any type) for children exposed to zonisamide was calculated to be 0.28% (95% CI 0.25–2.39) in the meta-analysis by Weston et al 2016.
The studies contain limited numbers of exposed pregnancies and for the studies that suggest an increased risk it is considered that the results may be affected by confounding. Clinical studies examining the effect of polytherapy are more limited and are restricted to data from the UK Epilepsy and Pregnancy Registry and the Australian Pregnancy Registry, involving more than 300 exposed pregnancies. Non-clinical studies in the published scientific literature in rodents showed neurodegenerative changes in the cerebral cortex and hippocampus of fetuses exposed to gabapentin during early and mid-pregnancy (Prakash et al 2008 and Badawy et al 2019). However, limitations in the design of these studies make them insufficient to determine the effects of gabapentin on the developing nervous system. An unpublished Good Laboratory Practice compliant study in pregnant rats showed non-dose-related behavioural changes in the performance of the offspring during tests of activity and emotionality but the changes were not statistically significantly different from those of the control animals. Overall, the non-clinical data does not provide clear evidence that exposure to gabapentin during pregnancy adversely affects the development of the central nervous system.
