RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 Fourteen-Year Follow-up in a Teenager with Congenital Long QT Syndrome Masquerading as Idiopathic Generalized Epilepsy
JF The Journal of the American Board of Family Medicine
JO J Am Board Fam Med
FD American Board of Family Medicine
SP 331
OP 334
DO 10.3122/jabfm.2009.03.080109
VO 22
IS 3
A1 Chuang, Wei-Yuan
A1 Chuang, Yao-Tsung
A1 Ueng, Kwo-Chang
YR 2009
UL http://www.jabfm.org/content/22/3/331.abstract
AB Long QT syndrome is a potentially lethal cardiac channelopathy that can be mistaken for epilepsy in young people. We report a 17-year-old man who was initially treated as having both daytime and nocturnal idiopathic epilepsy for 5 years. A series of electrocardiograms showed the time of the convulsive episodes, and genetic testing lead to the final diagnosis. The combined use of a β-blocker and a pacemaker implant incompletely abolished the torsade de pointes. After an additional near-fatal event, a cardioverter defibrillator was implanted as final bridge therapy. An electrocardiogram with the correct calculation of the QT interval should be performed on all young people with a suggestive history; that is, treat refractory convulsive episodes specifically with nondiagnostic electroencephalograms.