Evaluation of L-arginine Effects on Refractory Seizures in Epileptic Patients

Background: epilepsy is one of the common neurological disorders and approximately 0.5-1% of populations suffers from it. unfortunately, despite of treatment by antiepileptic drugs, between 20-30% of patients cannot be controlled completely. there are a lot of supplementary therapies for this group of patients and in this study, l-arginine was used as an additional therapy in refractory epileptic patients.methods: two groups of epileptic patients (n=21) were selected randomly. group 1 received lactose as a placebo, and group 2 received l-arginine (twofold of daily need) as a drug for three months. we used a standard questionnaire for evaluating the effect of l-arginine on the quality of life before and after the study.results: we did not find significant change in the quality of life of patients after using l-arginine, but the epileptic attacks decreased in l-arginine group significantly.conclusion: l-arginine therapy is safe and can decrease the rate of seizure attacks in refractory epileptic patients, and can be an alternative of ketogenic diets.