Table 16.

Adverse events ‐ number of participants and number of events

Drug	Number of participants randomised	Number of participants reporting adverse eventsa,b	Number of events reporteda,b
CBZ	5134	3023	9769
PHB	754	271	181
PHT	1384	614	1513
VPS	2303	1294	3599
LTG	3107	1608	6296
OXC	978	623	1000
TPM	1898	920	6316
GBP	1209	506	2580
LEV	948	1441	4258
ZNS	282	182	606
Total	18,045	10,482	36,118

CBZ: carbamazepine; GBP: gabapentin; LEV: levetiracetam; LTG: lamotrigine; OXC: oxcarbazepine; PHB: phenobarbitone; PHT: phenytoin; TPM: topiramate; VPS: sodium valproate; ZNS: zonisamide

^aAdverse event data were provided as detailed individual participant data for 23 trials and we extracted summary adverse event information from 36 trial publications. No adverse event data were reported in 18 trial publications. ^bSome trial publications reported only on the “most common” adverse events, the totals and frequencies are likely to be an underestimation of the true number of events and number of individuals experiencing events. Furthermore, detailed information was provided in the more recent trial publications and individual participant data requests of more recent trials, often involving newer antiepileptic drugs, such as LTG, LEV and TPM; which may indicate that these newer drugs are associated with more adverse events than older drugs such as PHB and PHT, for which less detailed information was available.