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In a drug-resistant epilepsy patient with continuous forearm/hand positive myoclonia due to a focal cortical dysplasia of the right motor cortex, cortical jerk-related and electromyographic activity were recorded for 15 min before and after 1 Hz rTMS (15 min, 10% below the resting excitability threshold) of the right motor cortex. A stable negative cortical spike, time-locked with contralateral muscle jerks (60100 microV), was detected only at perirolandic electrodes (maximal amplitudes: block 1 = 21.3 microV, block 2 = 22 microV, block 3 = 25.9 microV). After rTMS, only 20 muscle jerks accomplished the criterion of100 microV; blind back-averaging of these disclosed a topographically similar cortical spike, but with amplitude reduced by at least 50% (11.2 microV). This represents in vivo evidence of the possibility to selectively modulate the activity of an epileptic focus by intervening with local low-frequency rTMS.

Seventy five adult patients suffering from partial epilepsy were investigated by MRI. Results were then compared with those obtained with CT scan and EEG analysis. The interval between the two neuroradiological studies did not exceed five years. MRI and CT showed abnormalities respectively in 45 and 55% of patients, MRI showed a better sensitivity in detecting ischemic or atrophy-gliosis chronic focal alterations. In the remaining lesions such as tumors, vascular malformations, cysts and diffuse atrophies, where often an urgent diagnosis is necessary, both tests were equally sensitive. EEG showed alterations in 80% of patients and agreed with results of CT scan and MRI in about 80% of cases.

A case of Herpes Simplex Encephalitis with a benign course was present in a 66-year-old patient. A year after the acute phase of the illness, the patient continued to suffer from inability to fix verbal material in memory. During the acute phase, cerebral NMR revealed a large evolving lesion in the right temporal region, and an old lesion located in the same region of the opposite hemisphere. From the medical history, we learned that the patient, 35 years earlier, suffered a similar episode, including a short-term memory deficit. In the following study, we will discuss this case report in relation to data found in the literature dealing with memory deficit, caused by mono and bilateral, temporal lesions.