Fluency Patterns of Adult Females with Focal Epilepsy

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to determine the fluency patterns in female adults diagnosed with focal epilepsy. This study used a two-group parallel quasi-experimental design. Standard scores from the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) were collected in addition to a two-hundred-word narrative production and a semantic verbal fluency task from each of the nineteen adult female participants between 18 and 35 years of age. Six participants with focal epilepsy and thirteen non-epileptic peers were included. Narratives were recorded and analyzed for variations in speech fluency, while the MoCA and semantic verbal fluency task were used to analyze cognition and verbal fluency. The results indicated a significant difference in phonemic verbal fluency and cognition between those with focal epilepsy and the control group. No significant differences were observed for speech fluency or semantic verbal fluency between the two groups although trends were in the hypothesized directions. Additionally, family history of epilepsy and suspected diagnoses of TLE or FLE did not appear to affect speech, language, or cognitive outcomes.