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Thomas Bleck, MD; Frank Morrell, MD; Donna Bergen, MD; Ruzica Ristanovic, MD; Michael Smith, MD; Margaret Koch-Weser, PhD; Maggie German, RN, MSN
Department of Neurological Sciences Rush Medical College 1753 W Congress Pkwy Chicago, IL 60612

Arch Neurol. 1988;45(5):491.

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text PDF and any section headings.

To the Editor.

—In their recent report on electroencephalographic and clinical changes in seizure patients with slowly growing brain tumors, Hughes and Zak¹ provide interesting and useful data. However, they assert that "the yield from CT (computed tomography) at all ages can be expected to be only 5% to 7%, and in these days of cost containment... this yield would not seem to justify performing one of these expensive procedures on every patient (especially the indigent) with chronic seizures." We believe that this conclusion is misleading and, in addition, raises serious ethical and moral questions. A few examples may help illuminate these points.

Our current series of 87 patients who have undergone resective surgery for chronic partial epilepsy includes 14 (16%) with low-grade primary brain tumors (12 of glial origin and two gangliogliomata). Eleven (79%) had abnormal CT scans, of which only three (27% ) were thought to suggest a . . . [Full Text PDF of this Article]

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