Commentary on "High incidence of persistent sub-therapeutic levels of most common AEDs in children with epilepsy receiving polypharmacy"

Abstract

The paper by Czornyj et al. accepts the hypothesis that non-compliance/non-adherence to a therapeutic regimen may well explain the presence of low antiepileptic medication (AEM) blood levels in ambulatory patients but does not accept this as an explanation for low levels in patients who are admitted to hospital, The paper explores blood levels of the most commonly used AEMs, namely phenytoin (PHT), phenobarbitone (PHB), valproate (VPA) and carbamazepine (CBZ). It demonstrated higher rates of low PHT levels than was the case for PHB, VPA or CBZ.