Chemoconvulsant model of chronic spontaneous seizures.

Animal models of injury-induced epilepsy may provide insight into the mechanisms of acquired epilepsy. Previous animal models of temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE) were produced by acute treatments that often have high mortality rates and/or are associated with a low proportion of animals developing spontaneous, chronic motor seizures. In this unit, a protocol is provided for inducing chronic epilepsy in rats using multiple, low-dose, intraperitoneal injections of an excitotoxic agent, kainic acid. This protocol reliably induces TLE in nearly all treated rats (97% had at least two observed spontaneous motor seizures) with a relatively low mortality rate (<15%). This modified chemoconvulsant treatment protocol (i.e., multiple low doses) is efficient and relatively simple, and the properties of the chronic epileptic state appear similar to those of severe human TLE.