Drug-resistant epilepsy: modern concepts, integrative mechanisms, and therapeutic advances

Background: Drug-resistant epilepsy is the cause of severe disability. Multiple questions remain unanswered both in terms of pathogenesis and therapeutic management. For this narrative review, PubMed database and Infomedica library were searched by using “drug-resistance in epilepsy” and “treatment of drug-resistant epilepsy” as key words. The following filters were applied: “Clinical Trial”, “Meta-analysis”, “Multicenter Study”, and “Randomized Controlled Trial”, covering the period of 01.01.2005–06.01.2021.Several hypotheses have been proposed, i.e., pharmacokinetic, intrinsic severity, gene, target, transporter, and neural network hypotheses. Many controlled trials showed different results in terms of seizure control after combined methods of therapies. Immunotherapy, palliative epilepsy surgery alone or associated with neurostimulation procedures including vagus nerve, trigeminal nerve, or deep brain stimulation may be efficient, however, seizure freedom is not always achieved. Genetic epilepsies might benefit from gene and exosome therapy; however, further studies are needed to verify their safety. Conclusions: Neuroscience of drug-resistant epilepsy faces many challenges. Inflammatory mediators, biomarkers, and genes might allow the identification of new treatment targets, contribute to an earlier diagnosis, and assess the clinical outcomes.