Affiliations 

  • 1 Division of Neurology, Department of Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, University of Malaya, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Electronic address: kslimum@gmail.com
  • 2 Division of Neurology, Department of Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, University of Malaya, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
  • 3 Department of Psychological Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, University of Malaya, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
  • 4 Department of Clinical Psychology, Prince of Wales Hospital, Hospital Authority, Hong Kong; Division of Neurosurgery, Department of Surgery, Faculty of Medicine, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong
Epilepsy Behav, 2023 Nov;148:109455.
PMID: 37774547 DOI: 10.1016/j.yebeh.2023.109455

Abstract

OBJECTIVE: People with epilepsy (PWE) have a high prevalence of developing depression and anxiety. The objective is to determine the feasibility of brief screening tools to screen for depression and anxiety in epilepsy, and the predictive factors.

METHOD: This is a cross-sectional study in the neurology clinic in a tertiary teaching hospital in Kuala Lumpur. The screening tools used were the Neurological Disorders Depression Inventory for Epilepsy (NDDI-E) and the General Anxiety Disorder Form (GAD-7).

RESULTS: Five hundred and eighty-five patients were recruited in this study, and 50.8% of them were male, predominantly Chinese (46.7%), with a mean age of seizure onset of 21.8 ± 16.1 years. The majority had focal seizures (75.0%), and 41.9% had seizure remission. There were 15.5% who scored ≥15 in the NDDI-E, and 17.0% had moderate or severe anxiety (scored ≥10 in the GAD-7). In a regression model to predict the NDDI-E score, the age of seizure onset recorded a higher beta value (β = -0.265, p =

* Title and MeSH Headings from MEDLINE®/PubMed®, a database of the U.S. National Library of Medicine.