Uncommon, exceptional and atypical: A case of frontal lobe epilepsy due to cortical dysplasia

We report a case of frontal lobe epilepsy due to focal cortical dysplasia that included three independent unusual features. The patient, a 45-year-old, right-handed woman, had her first seizure at age 29, well into adulthood. Seizures had been easily controlled with medication for 15 years, then without provocation they became medically intractable during a single, identifiable day. Resection of the dysplastic tissue in the posterior dorsolateral right frontal cortex rendered the patient seizure-free, but produced a significant, non-fluent, Broca type, crossed aphasia. In addition, the seizure semiology was striking and remarkable, a common finding in frontal lobe epilepsy.