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The literature of the epilepsies has burgeoned in the past decade. This is particularly true of pediatric epileptology where basic mechanisms, including molecular biology and genetics; the identification of individual syndromes; and the identification of epileptogenic mechanisms at the neuronal level, the synaptic level, and the higher levels of systems involved in the propagation of the epileptic discharge, have been elucidated.
This book fills a void. Among the identification and classification of epileptic seizures and the epilepsies, knowledge about neonatal seizures has lagged. The lag has been contributed by the difficulty in identifying neonatal seizures, which are frequently subtle and less stereotyped than in the older child, frequently occur in the background of a severe brain disturbance, and depend in their pathophysiology on respiratory and blood flow changes resulting in energy failure in a system with its own fragile autoregulatory mechanisms.
This volume is divided into several sections. These include