FRONTO-TEMPORAL EPILEPSY AND OCCUPATIONAL EXPOSURE TO ORGANIC SOLVENTS

Introduction: Organic solvents are wildly used in industry. Many data in Literature show a mutual correlation between organic solvents exposure and brain deficiencies but rarely these chemical substance were considered as a possible cause of chronic epileptic seizures. Discussion: this case concern a 34 years old girl employed in a small industry for leather belt manufacturing. She was daily in contact with organic solvents (benzene by products used to remove glue from leather) without any personal protective equipment and in absence of local-general ventilation system. 6 month later, she developed cervical limp adenopathy associated with serious weariness, dizziness and breathe impairment. These symptoms occurred during solvents exposure and disappeared shortly after stopping exposure but returned just after a short term re-exposure to the toxics substances. 2 years later, she developed unconsciousness lasting few minutes and epileptic seizures. Her medical history was completely negative for neurological decease and instrumental investigations were entirely normal. Electroencephalogram (EEG) highlighted focal front-temporal epilepsy, so she lost her job and started specific during therapy. Conclusions: in our opinion, there is a pathological correlation between daily exposure of organic solvents and clinical symptoms like limph adenopathy, dizziness and breath impairment but this recurrent physical contact could be also the cause of chronic epileptic seizures. Anyway, the Literature agrees that etiopathological mechanism of epileptic seizures is not completely know and further neuropathological investigation need to best clarify that association.