Background: In patients with epilepsy (PWE), cognitive dysfunction becomes an important comorbidity. In PWE, cognitive dysfunction is thought to be linked to the processes of neurodegeneration that are triggered by the rise in homocysteine levels.
Objective: To determine whether PWE in Mataram, Indonesia, have a higher prevalence of cognitive dysfunction and higher serum homocysteine levels.
Methods: 81 PWE were recruited for this cross-sectional study from Mataram's three primary referral hospitals. The patients' serum homocysteine levels were measured by ELISA using five milliliters of fasting blood. The patients' sociodemographic (age, gender, and educational level) and clinical (etiology of epilepsy and treatment duration) characteristics were also gathered. Indonesian version of The Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA-Ina) was used to evaluate the cognitive status. The association between homocysteine, clinical, and socio-demographic data, as well as the cognitive dysfunction frequency in PWE was determined with final logistic regression model.
Results: The patients’ age was 33 years old on average. PWE had a cognitive dysfunction prevalence of 76.5 percent. PWE's high prevalence of cognitive dysfunction was not associated with serum homocysteine levels in the final logistic regression model (p > 0.05). Patients' clinical and sociodemographic characteristics were also not associated with a high prevalence of cognitive dysfunction (p > 0.05).
Conclusion: In Mataram, Indonesia, the high prevalence of cognitive dysfunction among PWE was not linked to serum homocysteine levels.
