Hospital admissions for epilepsy change with climatic factors

Changes in climate are possible trigger factors for seizure-related hospitalizations in patients with epilepsy, according to a study published online June 11 in the Journal of Clinical Medicine.

Thilo Hammen, from the Friedrich-Alexander-University Hospital Erlangen in Germany, and colleagues used data from 9,366 patients with epilepsy who were admitted to the hospital due to epileptic seizures to assess the influence of a spectrum of climatic factors and seasonal variations on hospital admissions.

The researchers found that climatic factors, such as precipitation and air pressure, can increase the frequency of hospital admissions for seizures in patients with general-onset epilepsy. However, patients with focal seizures were less prone to be impacted by climatic changes and, as a result, there was less of an effect seen on hospital admissions for focal seizures.

“As climate change intensifies meteorological and climatic factors and, consequently, their impact on human health in the following decades, it is urgently necessary to expand research on the effects of altered climate parameters and their impact on the course of diseases in the future,” the authors write.

“Multicenter, continent-related clinical studies and basic science studies, such as animal studies, are crucial in reliably assessing and comparing the influence of different global climatic factors on the genetic and pathophysiological basis of epilepsy.”

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