PROPOFOL IN PREHOSPITAL TREATMENT OF CONVULSIVE STATUS EPILEPTICUS

We studied the safety and efficacy of intravenous propofol in the out-of-hospital treatment of convulsive status epilepticus (SE) in 8 patients (age 29-70 years), 4 of them with posttraumatic epilepsy. Four patients had no history of seizures. Convulsions ceased promptly after patients received a bolus of 100-200 mg propofol administered before hospital admission by staff of a mobile intensive care unit (ICU). The median duration of coma was 3 h 15 min (range 2-41 h), and the median duration of hospital treatment was 3 1/2 days (range 12 h to 23 days). Only 1 patient was admitted to the hospital's ICU. No adverse effects were observed except for a transient decrease in systolic blood pressure (SEP). Propofol may be a useful drug for the prehospital treatment of recurrent seizures not responding to intravenous diazepam (DZP).