Racial differences in patient expectations prior to resective epilepsy surgery

We assessed the nature and frequency of preoperative expectations among patients with refractory epilepsy who were enrolled in a seven-center observational study of epilepsy surgery outcomes. At enrollment, patients responded to open-ended questions about expectations for surgical outcome. With the use of an iterative cutting-and-sorting technique, expectation themes were identified and rank-ordered. Associations of expectations with race/ethnicity were evaluated. Among 391 respondents, the two most frequently endorsed expectations (any rank order) were driving (62%) and job/school (43%). When only the most important (first-ranked) expectation was analyzed, driving (53%) and cognition (17%) were most frequently offered. Nonwhites endorsed job/school and cognition more frequently and driving less frequently than whites (all P ⩽ 0.05), whether expectations of any order or only first-ranked expectations were included. Elucidating the reason for these differences can aid in the clinical decision-making process for resective surgery and potentially address disparities in its utilization.