Serotonin and epilepsy

Background. Studies of serotonin in epilepsy are numerous, but the importance of serotonin in this condition requires further study. The purpose of the study was to analyze the clinical features of patients with epilepsy and their serotonin levels in the blood serum during the interictal period. Materials and methods. The clinical research was conducted in Batumi Medical Center. Eighty individuals with epilepsy were examined: 35 (43.75 %) men and 45 (56.25 %) women; their mean age was 50 ± 7 years. All patients had a history of epileptic seizures for at least one year. Among them, there were 55 (68.75 %) people with symptomatic epilepsy who suffered organic brain injury. Symptomatic partial epilepsy was diagnosed in 3 (3.75 %) cases, while generalized epilepsy in 22 (27.5 %). The genesis of epilepsy was confirmed by neuroimaging technique (brain magnetic resonance imaging). Based on the analysis of clinical data, we isolated three groups of patients who differed in the severity and course of epilepsy and had no differences in the etiology of seizures, gender and age: group 1 — severely ill people with frequent epileptic seizures (5–10 times a year), with a chronic course of the disease; group 2 — individuals with stable disease course, patients with rare epileptic seizures (2–3 times a year); group 3 — those with a history of epilepsy of one year. The control group consisted of 20 apparently healthy patients. Results and сonclusions. In healthy people, serotonin levels decreased by 12.1 % (p