SEEG Investigation of Mood Dysregulation in People With Epilepsy

It is well known that epilepsy is associated with mood dysregulation including symptoms of labile mood, impulse control problems, anxiety, depression and increase in incidence of suicide. However, until present the neurobiological basis of mood dysregulation in epilepsy has not been clear and has been mostly attributed to a psychological reaction to the illness. This has severely limited our understanding of the impairments in mood regulation that people with epilepsy often experience and has also limited the development of effective treatment for ameliorating psychosocial dysfunction in people with epilepsy. The identification of these circuits will not only increase our understanding of mood-regulation in epilepsy but also possibly provide biomarkers with which the effectiveness of new treatments can be investigated. Developing better diagnostic measures and treatments for mood dysregulation will be highly beneficial to the quality of life of subjects suffering from epilepsy.