Authors

1 Department of Psychology, Science and Research Branch, Islamic Azad University, Tehran, Iran.

2 Department of Neurology, Shohadaye Tajrish Hospital, Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran.

3 Department of Neurology, Dalhousie University, Nova Scotia, Canada.

4 Neuroscience Department, Faculty of Advanced Technology in Medicine Science, Iran University of Medical Science, Tehran, Iran.

5 Department of Psychology, Allameh Tabatabai University, Tehran, Iran.

Abstract

Background
Epilepsy is among the most common neurological disorders in childhood, prevalence of which is increasing. Unpredictable and chronic nature of the disease affects physical, social and mental functions of the children and their family. This study was aimed to compare behavioral problems in epileptic children group versus healthy control group.
Materials and Methods
This study is a case-control one conducted from January 2013 to June 2016 in Tehran, Iran. The epileptic children in age of 7-10 years old that were diagnosed by neurologist referred to the researcher for further process. Their parents were provided with Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL) to be completed. For matching by age and gender, the healthy group was sampled after the epilepsy group. Multivariate Analysis of Variance was used for statistical analysis.
Results
In this study 94 children with epilepsy and 83 healthy children in age of 7-10 years old were studied. The results indicated that there were significantly higher behavioral problems in the children with epilepsy than in control group in nine categories of seclusiveness, physical complaints, anxiety and depression, social problems, thought problems, attention problems, delinquent behaviors, aggressive behaviors, and other problems. Comparison of two generalized and partial epilepsy groups indicated that there was a significant difference only in attention problems (p = 0.024).
Conclusion
The present study indicates that the children with epilepsy have more behavioral problems as compared to control group. Therefore, educational and psychological interventions are necessary for supporting desirable psychosocial growth and development of such children.

Keywords