Significant correlation of the SCN1A mutations and severe myoclonic epilepsy in infancy

To investigate the possible correlation between genotype and phenotype of epilepsy, we analyzed the voltage-gated sodium channel α1-subunit (SCN1A) gene, β1-subunit (SCN1B) gene, and γ-aminobutyric acid A receptor γ2-subunit (GABRG2) gene in DNAs from peripheral blood cells of 29 patients with severe myoclonic epilepsy in infancy (SME) and 11 patients with other types of epilepsy. Mutations of the SCN1A gene were detected in 24 of the 29 patients (82.7%) with SME, although none with other types of epilepsy. The mutations included deletion, insertion, missense, and nonsense mutations. We could not find any mutations of the SCN1B and GABRG2 genes in all patients. Our data suggested that the SCN1A mutations were significantly correlated with SME ( p