Basim Uthman, M.D.
Associate Professor of Neurology

Phone: (352) 273-5550
Fax: (352) 273-5575
basim.uthman@neurology.ufl.edu

Department of Neurology
L3-100 McKnight Brain Institute
Newell Drive
Gainesville, FL. 32610

Professional Background: M.D.

Personal Info
Dr. Uthman is an attending epileptologist for both the neurology services at the VA Medical Center and Shands Teaching Hospital Epilepsy Monitoring Unit. He is board certified by the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology (ABPN), American Board of Clinical Neurophysiology, and the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology—additional competence with special qualifications in clinical neurophysiology.

Dr. Uthman is based at the VAMC and serves as a consultant for Shands Hospital advising the neurology team on planning diagnostic workups for potential epilepsy surgery patients. He sets an initial individual plan for each case on admission to the hospital and may modify it on daily follow-ups. Using stored video and digital EEG data, Dr. Uthman reviews events and interictal information captured on the video/EEG telemetry system and determines whether the events reviewed are epileptic seizures or some other type of spells such as psychogenic pseudoseizures. As an electroencephalographer he attempts to identify a consistent focal EEG onset of the stereotyped seizures or at least lateralize the onset to one of the hemispheres or lobes. After neuropsychological testing and special neuroimaging studies are done, all data is presented and discussed at a weekly Epilepsy Management Conference, which includes a neuroradiologist, a neuropsychologist, the neurosurgeon, an EMU tech., epilepsy nurse practitioners, and all three epileptologists. At this meeting, recommendations are formulated to go forth with resective surgery after passing the Wada test, to deny surgery, or to readmit for phase II invasive monitoring with depth electrodes, or with subdural plates and strips. Dr. Uthman supervises the intraarterial sodium Brevital test to determine speech and memory lateralization and interprets electrocorticography in the operating room to assist the neurosurgeon in identifying the epileptogenic focus or mapping eloquent or other functionally important cortical areas prior to resection. As an expert in vagus nerve stimulation (VNS) using the NeuroCybernetic Prosthesis (NCP) system, and as a busy clinical antiepileptic drug (AED) trial investigator, he offers VNS or one of the experimental AEDs under study to patients with medically intractable complex partial seizures.

Research Interests
Dr. Uthman is interested in studying the safety, efficacy, and pharmacology of new AEDs. He has completed several trials including topiramate, tiagabine, lamotrigine, gabapentin, vigabatrin, zonisamide, and fosphenytoin to name a few. He is currently conducting four protocols on three new AEDs; one intravenous and two oral drugs. Dr. Uthman is one of the early researchers who pioneered in studying the feasibility of VNS in the human subject. The early work in pilot studies accomplished by Dr. Uthman and his colleagues has led to two multicenter double-blind randomized studies, which in turn led to the approval of VNS as a viable adjunctive therapy for complex partial seizures. Dr. Uthman has the largest and longest experience with VNS in the human subjects.

Other interests include the study of free radical scavengers in the treatment of progressive myoclonic epilepsy and other neurodegenerative disorders such as spino cerabellar atrophy, Friedreich's ataxia, and ataxia telangiectasia. Dr. Uthman serves as the neurologist of the spinal cord transplant team at the University of Florida, and he is interested in the study of regeneration of neuronal tissue as evidenced by changes in neurological examinations and clinical neurophysiological studies such as evoked potentials. Finally there have been claims that dogs can be trained to alert their owners prior to seizure occurrences. In collaboration with colleagues from the veterinary medical school, Dr. Uthman is studying this phenomenon of "seizure alert dogs."

Selected Publications

B.M. Uthman; A. James Rowan, Peter A. Ahmann, Ilo E. Leppik, Steven C. Schachter, Kenneth W. Sommerville, and Vincent Shu: Tiagabine for Complex Partial Siezures; A Randomized Add-on, Dose-Response Trial. Archives of Neurology 55:56-62, 1998.

B.M. Uthman, B.J. Wilder, and R.E. Ramsey: Intramuscular use of Fosphenytoin. Neurology 4 (Suppl):S24-28, 1996

B.M. Uthman, B.J. Wilder, J.K. Penry, C. Dean, R.E. Ramsey, S.A. Reid, E.J. Hammond, W.B. Tarver, J.F. Wernicke: Treatment of epilepsy by stimulation of the vagus nerve. Neurology 43: 1338-1345, 1992.

Publications Extracted from Medline
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