Interictal epileptiform discharges contribute to word-finding difficulty in epilepsy through multiple cognitive mechanisms.

IEDs appear to act through multiple cognitive mechanisms to form a convergent basis for the debilitating clinical word-finding difficulty reported by patients with epilepsy. This was particularly notable for medial temporal spikes which are quite common in adult focal epilepsy. In parallel with the treatment of seizures, the modulation of interictal discharges through emerging pharmacological means and neurostimulation approaches may be an opportunity to help address devastating memory and language impairments in epilepsy.