Tu YF, et al. - In children born extremely preterm, researchers examined the incidence of epilepsy and identified neonatal risk morbidities for epilepsy. Six hundred eighty-six had longitudinal neurodevelopmental follow-up assessments up to 5 years of age of the 806 very preterm infants (birth weight < 1,500 g, gestational age < 32 weeks) who survived and were discharged from the four neonatal intensive care units in southern Taiwan between 2003 and 2012. Data reported that 19 very preterm children showed epilepsy at a mean age of 19 ± 14 months. Investigators found that epilepsy incidence was highest among infants with neonatal seizure, followed by cystic periventricular leukomalacia (cPVL), high-grade intraventricular hemorrhage (IVH), and necrotizing enterocolitis (NEC) stage III. Also independent neonatal risk morbidities for epilepsy were NEC stage III, neonatal seizure, high-grade IVH, and cPVL. In addition, epilepsy incidence was 21.6% in preterm children with significant neonatal brain injury (SNBI; ie, high-grade IVH and cPVL), but only 1% in preterm children without SNBI. Neonatal seizure was higher in preterm children with epilepsy than in those without epilepsy among preterm children with SNBI. NEC stage III was higher in preterm children with epilepsy than in those without epilepsy among preterm children without SNBI. Epileptic preterm children were prone to have neurodevelopmental disability independent of whether they had a neonatal brain injury, and drug-resistant epilepsy, especially those with high-grade neonatal IVH.