Prolonged Intermittent Drooling and Oromotor Dyspraxia in Benign Childhood Epilepsy with Centrotemporal Spikes

Prolonged isolated sialorrhea of epileptic origin was described by Penfield and Jasper (1954) in a patient with a lesional epilepsy. A child with prolonged but intermittent drooling, lingual dyspraxia, and other clinical and electroencephalographic (EEG) features compatible with benign childhood epilepsy with centrotemporal spikes (BCECS) is described. The fluctuant course of the symptomatology and correlation with the intensity of the paroxysmal discharges on EEG are consistent with an epileptic dysfunction located in the lower rolandic fissure. No lesion was demonstrated by magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). Our case bears analogies with the recently reported status epilepticus of BCECS and the "acquired aphasia-epilepsy syndrome."