Dear Anthony! Congratulation. Your idea deserves attention.

Vladimir

I am  aware that brain damage-associated seizures can be delayed for years after the primary insult, only to start manifesting much later.

"I am aware that brain damage-associated seizures can be delayed for years after the primary insult, only to start manifesting much later."

I agree this can happen with traumatic injuries in adults, but neurological brain damage models for adults should not be applied to infants.  I still maintain that in infants with known brain lesions, when seizures occur they occur very early in life, or at least with a markedly different age distribution to seizures in autism. 

I do not believe that seizures in autistic children are audiogenic. Autistic children are very sensitive to sound but does not mean that sound provoked epileptic seizures in that group.There are separate group of reflex seizures-epilepsies  provoked with certain stimulus  such as : eating epilepsy, reading epilepsy , hot water epilepsy, photosensitive epilepsy, audiogenic seizures, but they are not exclusively in connection with autistic children. Reflex epilepsies are relatively rare, occurring in only 5% of all epilepsies.

I personally had no autistic children with audiogenic seizures, but it can happened.

"There are separate group of reflex seizures-epilepsies provoked with certain stimulus"

I agree this literature is not the model for autism, whereas the priming by loud sound in animal models of epilepsy is.  I think in autism it is the chronic effect of excessive auditory input, physiologically (cochlear hyperactivity) and not just subjectively, that primes and overload subcortical auditory centres.  Their late onset of seizures clearly flags some cumulative learning, damage or adaptive process. 

Actually, in animal models of epilepsy induced by loud sound, once initiated the epilepsy has a trajectory of its own, and is then not reflexive, at least from loud sounds.  If so, it makes my theory hard to disprove!

 Come across more books but few papers.  

Pathophysiology of Epilepsy in Autism Spectrum Disorders

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK98169/pdf/Bookshelf_NBK98169.pdf

What accounts for the 25% seizure rate in those with autism spectrum disorders?

https://www.quora.com/What-accounts-for-the-25-seizure-rate-in-those-with-autism-spectrum-disorders

GABAergic Dysfunction in Autism and Epilepsy

http://cdn.intechopen.com/pdfs-wm/18060.pdf

"Come across more books but few papers."

I don't think any of these sources are likely to be of any help: indeed, if they were I would not need to put up this question.   What are far more useful, at least at this stage, are the observations of autistic persons and their parents.  If autistic seizures are audiogenic, then surely someone must have spotted this already.

"Re: 7 yr old seizures and autism/hearing loss/adhd, etc

     Submitted by coffeeclimber on Tue, 2010-11-09 16:21

I have sensorineural hearing loss. We're pretty sure I was born with it, but nobody knew until my first hearing test at age 5 since I learned to talk ok, everyone just thought I was very shy and a daydreamer. I didn't have a seizure until age 13. I don't have autism or ADD but my sister is bipolar and ADD and my dad is ADD. There are still so many things dr's don't know about these things. I wish I could tell you what it is. I always thought my hearing was related to my epilepsy, since ANY noises when I'm really tired will give me myoclonic jerks with bright flashes of light. The seizure type I normally get is complex partial seizure with loss of consciousness, only right after waking up from sleep. Let me know if a dr is able to tell you anything new! I'm dying to know. Epilepsy can be scary!

Also, if you're worried about your son's language delays and all that, maybe cut back on meds? Unless his seizures pose a real threat.

I always get an aura and know when it will happen..."

I wouldn't share the conclusions that encephalopathy with seizures presents at birth. The whole group of benign focal epilepsies (BEOP, Rolando, and the likes) are related to some genetic problem, where the gene product is activated during maturation of the brain. Encephalopathies presenting with seizures frequently present epilepsy later in life (see e.g. Dravet's or Aicardi-syndrome). Auditory hypersensivity occurs in other conditions too, notoriously in migraine. Third, it may sometimes be difficult to differentiate auditory startle reaction from a seizure (history taking sometimes is difficult...). So I think that audiogenic seizures are unlikely, rather that auditory hypersensitivity and seizures may be two conditions related to the underlying more global brain dysfunction in autism. (or is there a variant of encephalopathy presenting with autism, distinct auditory problems, and associated seizures to be described?)

"is there a variant of encephalopathy presenting with autism, distinct auditory problems, and associated seizures to be described?)"

• All causes of autism, including encephalopathies, are also causes of peripheral ear disease, which is the only proven cause of audiosensitivity.  
• Animal models of epilepsy depend on damage to the cochlea, not to the brain
• Audiosensitivity in migraine might theoretically be caused by activity in ear or brain, so look to its accompaniments.  These are quite clearly other features of Meniere Spectrum Disorder: dizziness, ear fullness, etc.  Aurae are particularly associated with objective peripheral vestibular dysfunction, so are plausibly triggered by vestibular reflexes.
• I was not arguing against the general concept of some late onset neurological causes of epilepsy, but that when we are sure that there is definite early brain damage, then the seizures are of far earlier onset than in autism.