What Are the Treatments for Febrile Convulsions?

Febrile convulsions are the most common seizures affecting children. These seizures usually begin when the child is between 18 and 22 months of age, and typically continue until about age 5. Children under age 5 are more susceptible to seizures when they have fever and seizures often occur after a child has been immunized. Febrile convulsions can potentially affect any child, but boys and children with a family history of the condition have a higher risk.

Symptoms and Duration

• Symptoms of febrile convulsions include staring, stiff or rigid muscles, becoming limp, jerking movements on one or both sides and loss of consciousness. Febrile convulsions can last from 1 to 15 minutes, but average seizure time is 6 minutes. Less than 10 percent of children who experience febrile convulsions will have them last longer than 15 minutes. These children need immediate medical attention to avoid neurological damage.

Causes

• Febrile convulsions can be caused by a prenatal injury from hemorrhage or infection, trauma at birth and being born with an infection such as rubella or HIV. They may also be caused by trauma or infections occurring after birth, stroke, tumor and drug withdrawal. Some causes of febrile convulsion come from genetic or chromosomal brain development disorders and a child being born with metabolic errors that prevent proper brain functioning.

Risks

• The risk of having febrile convulsions is higher for children who have their first seizure before 18 months of age, have a seizure in the first hours of an illness and those who have a family history of the condition. Febrile convulsions increase the risk of developing epilepsy for children whose seizures last 15 minutes or longer, who have more than 2 seizures within a 24 hour period and those who have a neurological disorder such as cerebral palsy.

Treatment

• Treatment of febrile convulsions includes medicine therapy. This could include medicine to reduce fever and make the patient more comfortable or anticonvulsant drugs. Because each child responds differently to medicine therapy, physicians must determine which medicines and what doses work best for the patient to relieve febrile convulsions. Some patients who don't respond well to typical treatments may be placed on a medically supervised diet or hormonal therapy. In some cases, brain surgery may be considered when medicine and other treatments do not work.

Long-term Treatment

• Long-term treatment is usually not necessary for those who have febrile convulsions since most children grow out of them. Physicians prefer not to prescribe anticonvulsants for long periods because of possible side effects and questions about their effectiveness. Children who are prone to recurrent febrile convulsions may be prescribed the medicine diazepam when they experience high fever.

Outcome

• Only 3 to 4 percent of all children will have one febrile convulsion, but as many as 40 percent of those with the condition will continue to have seizures. Most of the children who have febrile convulsions will outgrow the condition by age 5, and continue to grow and develop normally. A small number of children will continue to have febrile convulsions which lead them to develop epilepsy.