Clinical, Psychological and Neuropsychological Profiling Indicators of Patients Diagnosed with Psychogenic Non-Epileptic Seizures

PNES patients demonstrated higher overall levels of cognitive functioning, and impairments in visual memory and fluid intelligence capacities. Epilepsy patients manifested impairments in long term verbal working memory, particularly in relation to heterogeneous material. PNES patients had a wider scope and intensity of traumatic experiences, while patients with epilepsy reported a higher collective identity. The proximity of the clinical, neuropsychological and psychological profiles of the two patient groups could be suggestive of a cross-over movement between the impairments in PNES and epilepsy. These findings present challenges for diagnosis and add to the complexity of identifying reliable and valid diagnostic tools.