Research PaperFunctional difficulties and school limitations of children with epilepsy: Findings from the 2009–2010 National Survey of Children with Special Health Care Needs
Section snippets
Data source
The 2009–2010 NS-CSHCN is a nationally representative periodic survey designed to examine the health, functional status, and health care of CSHCN ages 0–17 in the US. In the 2009–2010 NS-CSHCN, a random-digit dial (RDD) sample of landline telephone numbers supplemented by a RDD sample of cell-phone numbers was used to identify households with children less than 18 years of age. A parent or guardian was the proxy respondent for each child. A screening interview (screener) consisting of five
Measures of Special Health Care Needs (SHCN), epilepsy, and comorbid conditions
Children were identified as having current epilepsy by a yes response to the following two questions: “Has a doctor or other health care provider ever told you that [child's name] had epilepsy or seizure disorder?” and “Does [child's name] currently have epilepsy or seizure disorder?” To better evaluate the association between epilepsy and children's functional difficulties, children were categorized into two groups: 1) children who currently had one or more of the following selected comorbid
Prevalence of epilepsy among CSHCN with and without comorbid conditions
Among all CSHCN aged 6–17, 3% were reported by parents to currently have epilepsy (Fig. 1). Approximately 1.6% of CSHCN were reported by parents to have epilepsy with one or more of the following comorbid conditions: intellectual disability, cerebral palsy, autism, or traumatic brain injury/concussion, and 1.4% were reported to have epilepsy without one of these conditions. Slightly more than 11% of CSHCN were reported to have one or more of the comorbid conditions, but not to have epilepsy.
Discussion
Findings from this large, nationally representative study of CSHCN indicate that children with epilepsy differed from other CSHCN not only in the prevalence of functional difficulties, but also in the percentage of children with limitations in school attendance. A higher percentage of CSHCN with epilepsy, compared to CSHCN without epilepsy, had difficulty in several areas of basic functioning including difficulties with communication. Higher rates of functional difficulties were reported for
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Funding source: No external funding was secured for this study.
Conflict of interest: The authors have no conflicts of interest or financial relationships to disclose.