Regional cerebral blood flow of patients with focal epilepsy studied using xenon enhanced CT brain scanning.

Stable xenon-enhanced X-ray computed tomography (XeCT) was used to measure the regional cerebral blood flow (rCBF) of 12 patients with drug resistant partial epilepsy and a marked unilateral focus on electroencephalography (EEG). Interictal mean rCBF of fixed regions of interest (ROIs) was reduced by 25% in the cortex of the epileptogenic cerebral lobe compared with the same regions on the contralateral side (p less than 0.02). Six control scans showed a mean side to side cortical difference in rCBF of 14%, whereas the epileptogenic focus was associated with a reduction in the cortical rCBF of greater than 30% in six out of the 12 patients. In an additional patient with partial epilepsy XeCT demonstrated significant focal hypoperfusion when interictal EEGs and conventional CT scans showed no abnormalities.