Evidence From Meta-Analysis Supports Ictal Magnetoencephalographic Source Imaging as an Accurate Method in Presurgery Evaluation of Patients With Drug-Resistant Epilepsy

Abstract

Background.

Successful epilepsy surgery relies on localization and removal of the brain area responsible for initializing the seizures called the epileptogenic zone (EZ). Intracranial EEG (icEEG) is gold standard of this localization but has several limitations like invasiveness and limited covered area. A noninvasive method with accurate localization precision is therefore desirable. The aim of this article is to investigate the following hypotheses: (1) Ictal onset zone as localized by magnetic source imaging (iMSI) can reliably localize the EZ in focal epilepsy and (2) this localization is as good as that of icEEG.

Methods.

Six original studies and a total of 59 unique patients were included in a meta-analysis.

Results.

Sensitivity and specificity of iMSI based on surgery outcome were 77% (95% CI 60%-90%) and 75% (95% CI 53%-90%), respectively. Specificity of iMSI was statistically higher than that of icEEG. There was no significant difference between sensitivity of iMSI and icEEG.

Conclusion.

The meta-analysis supports that iMSI is an accurate method, achieving similar sensitivity and higher specificity than icEEG. However, at present the use of the method is limited by short recording times. A limitation that might be overcome in the future using technical advances.