THE EARLY IDENTIFICATION OF ANTICONVULSANT ACTIVITY - ROLE OF THE MAXIMAL ELECTROSHOCK AND SUBCUTANEOUS PENTYLENETETRAZOL SEIZURE MODELS

A number of widely different animal seizure models have been employed in the search for new and novel anticonvulsant drugs useful for the tr atment of human epilepsy. At present, no single laboratory test will,, in itself, establish the presence or absence of anticonvulsant activi ty or fully predict the clinical potential of a test substance. Of the many available animal models, the maximal electroshock (MES) and subc utaneous pentylenetetrazol (scPTZ) tests still represent the most comm only employed models for the routine screening and identification of n ew anticonvulsant drugs, This chapter will briefly describe how these two tests are conducted, their limitations and how they have contribut ed in the past and to the present day anticonvulsant drug discovery pr ocess.