Affective Illness and Epilepsy

Letter to the Editor

Sir: We read with interest the paper by Dr. Blumer because
affective illness in patients with epilepsy is an important problem,
but we do not believe the data he presents adequately support
his hypothesis. The concept of "subictal affective illness"
was popular some years ago. Some patients with temporal lobe
seizures experience affective symptoms acutely as an ictal phenomenon,
but cases in which chronic affective symptoms are
due to epileptic discharges have not been documented.