Behavioral Psychophysiological Intervention in a Mentally Retarded Epileptic Patient with Brain Lesion

Authors: Holzapfel S.¹; Strehl U.²; Kotchoubey B.³; Birbaumer N.⁴

Source: Applied Psychophysiology and Biofeedback, Volume 23, Number 3, September 1998 , pp. 189-202(14)

Publisher: Springer

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Abstract:

Behavioral psychophysiological treatment entailing Slow Cortical Potential (SCP) biofeed-back training and behavioral self-control training was conducted with a 27-year-old male epileptic patient (seizures for 23 years) with Wechsler IQ 64 who underwent callosotomy. The patient had 12/week secondary generalized tonic-clonic seizures. The treatment, consisting of 43 SCP training sessions and 22 behavioral control sessions, yielded a highly significant reduction of seizure frequency to about 7.5/week; such a decrease had never been observed after administration of new anticonvulsant drugs, nor after the callosotomy. During SCP feedback training, the patient was able to produce highly-significant cortical differentiation of SCPs of about 4 µV. In addition, he developed several new behaviors indicating growing ability of self-perception and self-regulation. These findings suggest that a combination of SCP biofeedback with behavioral treatment of epilepsy can be used even in mentally retarded patients with organic brain disorders.

Keywords: behavioral therapy; biofeedback; epilepsy; mental retardation; self-regulation; slow cortical potentials (SCP)

Language: English

Document Type: Research article

Affiliations: 1: Epilepsy Center Kork, Kehl-Kork, Germany 2: Institute for Medical Psychology and Behavioral Neurobiology, University of Tübingen, Tübingen Germany 3: Institute of Medical Psychology and Behavioral Neurobiology, Tübingen, Germany 4: Institute of Medical Psychology and Behavioral Neurobiology, Tübingen, Germany. Department of Psychology, University of Padova, Italy

Publication date: 1998-09-01