Are COVID-19 vaccines safe for people with epilepsy? A cross-sectional study

• Published in: Neurological sciences 2022-06, Vol.43 (6), p.3489-3496
• Main Authors: Özdemir, Hüseyin Nezih, Dere, Birgül, Gökçay, Figen, Gökçay, Ahmet
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Adverse events; Convulsions & seizures; Coronaviruses; Covid-19; COVID-19 - prevention & control; COVID-19 vaccines; COVID-19 Vaccines - adverse effects; Cross-Sectional Studies; Epilepsy; Humans; Immunization; Medicine; Medicine & Public Health; Neurology; Neuroradiology; Neurosciences; Neurosurgery; Pandemics; Patients; Psychiatry; SARS-CoV-2; Seizures; Seizures - epidemiology; Vaccines
• ISSN: 1590-1874; 1590-3478
• DOI: 10.1007/s10072-022-05956-6

Background COVID-19 disease was first seen in December 2019 and was declared a pandemic soon after. To fight the pandemic, there is an immense need for effective vaccines. The purposes of our study were to investigate the effect of coronavirus vaccines on seizures in people with epilepsy (PWE) and assess the adverse events of COVID-19 vaccine in PWE. Methods This was a cross-sectional study. We included epilepsy patients who got vaccinated with two or three doses at least 1 month earlier. We gathered the data using a standardized form. The form contained questions about patients’ demographic features, clinical features, and information about the vaccination and its adverse events. The questionnaire included questions about epilepsy-related adverse events. Results We included 178 people with epilepsy in our study. The frequency of adverse events was lower than clinical studies of the vaccines. The mean number of seizures in the month before the vaccination was 1.62, between the doses was 1.61, and after vaccination was 1.64. There was no significant difference in the number of monthly seizures before the vaccination, the month between the doses, or the month after the vaccination ( p  = 0.46). Conclusions The vaccines under consideration in our study were tolerated well by the epilepsy patients. The vaccines did not affect the monthly number of seizures of the PWE. A small number of patients had more seizures than normal after vaccination. We think that benefits of the vaccines outweigh the slightly increased possibility of having a seizure after vaccination.