Febrile Seizures

Abstract

A 2-year-old female presents to a local emergency room following a 20-min generalized tonic-clonic seizure. The parents witnessed the seizure begin without warning. The seizure consisted of rhythmic jerking of the body and extremities without lateralizing features that could be identified. After termination of the event, the child was listless and without spontaneous interaction. She was the full-term product of non-consanguineous parents following a normal pregnancy and uneventful spontaneous vaginal delivery. With the exception of this event, she has been a normal healthy child with age-appropriate development. She had received all of the required immunizations for the usual childhood diseases. She was not taking any medications at the time of her seizure. This young girl had been noted to be “sick” prior to the onset of the seizure and had been exposed to other children who had recently experienced the flu. Upon assessment, in the emergency room, she was initially very irritable and uncooperative. She had a temperature of 103° and an apparent inflammation of the right tympanic membrane upon examination. Following ibuprofen, her temperature resolved. Within 60 min she was cooperative and had a normal neurological examination.