Who coined the term “status gelasticus”? We did

Abstract

Yu-tze NgDivision of Pediatric Neurology, Barrow Neurological Institute, Phoenix, AZ, USAIn a recent review article on gelastic seizures and hypothalamic hamartoma, Tellez-Zenteno and colleagues used the term, “status gelasticus” mostly correctly but referenced completely incorrectly the origins of the definition of this rare but becoming increasingly known phenomenon. This mistake followed upon an unusual oversight of quoting another author who had simply used the term and most certainly did not make any attempts to define it. We had initially published a case report of a 30-month-old boy who underwent successful emergent transcallosal resection of his hypothalamic hamartoma for status gelasticus which lasted six weeks!3 In this report, we made clear mention that we labeled his “history of near-continuous gelastic seizures” as status gelasticus.