Loading...
Choice of initial therapy for seizures may be confusing, especially with the introduction of many relatively new antiepileptic medications. In a two-arm, randomized, nonblinded, long-term follow-up study, researchers compared the efficacy of older and newer medications among patients (older than 4 years) seen at U.K. outpatient clinics during more than 4 years. The trial was partially supported by industry.
In the first arm, 1721 patients with partial epilepsy received carbamazepine, gabapentin, lamotrigine, oxcarbazepine, or topiramate. For seizure control, carbamazepine was associated with more rapid time to 12- and 24-month remission, followed by lamotrigine and oxcarbazepine, which were similarly efficacious. For time to treatment failur…