Epilepsy

Epilepsy – General Information

Epilepsy is a nervous system disorder which affects more than 7 million people every year. It can be quite a frightening disease and most of the people find it scary to watch a person who is having an epileptic seizure. In such situation, the sufferer can be conscious, he can make unwilling movements, he usually can not understand what is happening around him and he can go through some extreme feelings and emotions, such as fear. Once the seizure has passes, the patient usually feels weak, tired or confused. In the case of those who suffer from Epilepsy, the seizures appear when the electrical indicators in the brain break down. This way the normal electrical activity of the brain is interrupted and this leads to severe problems of communication between the nerves located in different cells. Even though the most common sign of this disease are the seizures, it is not necessary for a person who experiences such attacks to suffer from this disease. Such attacks can also appear in the case of a life-threatening situation, such as the exposure to a high temperature or a prolonged dehydration. However, if seizures appear over and over again with no exact reason, it is almost certain that the person suffers from Epilepsy. As reports show, this disease is more frequent among young children or teenagers; on the other hand, it can also affect adults or even old people. If the disease affects a young children and it is treated properly, the seizures can disappear completely.

Epilepsy - Symptoms

Epilepsy is a disease which you can not catch from another person and it is not inherited, which means that you would not suffer from this disease if one of your family members had it. The symptoms which characterize this disease are the seizures which, even though they look quite frightening, do not cause pain. These symptoms can be different from a patient to another, but they can be separated in two big categories: partial seizures and generalized seizures. In the case of partial seizures, the patient has to know that they appear in only one part of the brain. The electrical problems which appear can remain I that side of the brain or they can also affect other parts. Some particular signs and symptoms which appear in the case of partial seizures are the loss of consciousness, the twitching of some parts of the body (an arm, a leg, a finger or a foot) or a temporarily lost of vision. The appearance and evolution of these signs depend on the place where the seizure develops. In the case of generalized seizures, the seizures affect all of the brain. In this case, the person can experience sudden moves, because of the contraction of the muscles, daydreaming or loss of consciousness. The sufferer can also pass out suddenly.
However, the seizures, the most common signs of Epilepsy do not last for a long time, just a few minutes or even seconds. After a seizure is over, the patient can experience tiredness or confusion for a couple of hours.

Epilepsy – Treatment

In the case you experience sudden and repeated seizures, you should consult a doctor as soon as possible in order to obtain a sure diagnosis of your problem. Your personal doctor will probably recommend you to visit a neurologist, too. The neurologist will firstly examine your physical condition and then, he will probably ask some questions about your symptoms, your general health condition, whether there are or not cases of Epilepsy in your family, about your allergies and the medications you have been taken recently. The doctor will probably want you to describe the attacks you have experienced; if you do not remember what happened during the attacks you should ask a friend or a family member who saw the attacks to describe them.

In order to find out whether you suffer from Epilepsy or not, the doctor will also perform one or more of these tests: an electroencephalogram, in order to determine the electrical activity in the brain, a computerized tomography or a magnetic imaging test. If the results of all these examinations show that the person suffers from Epilepsy, the doctor will choose the most appropriate type of treatment. The most common type of treatment for this disease is the administration of drugs. The purpose of the treatment is to control and reduce the number of attacks a patient is experiencing. In addition to the administration of drugs, a doctor can also recommend the implantation of a vagus, which is a device which controls the seizures or he can establish a special diet. In more severe cases, when the disease can not be controlled using drugs or an implant, the doctor can choose to perform a direct surgery on the brain. 
The most important thing that the people who suffer from Epilepsy should know is the fact that they can live in a normal way. There are a lot of famous doctors, authors, artists or politicians who suffered from this disease but they continued their lives in a normal way.

Even though you suffer from this disease, you can still have a job, you can get involved in a lot of activities and you can start a family. Your doctor will prepare you for the attacks; for example, you can still go swimming, but you must make sure that there is also a person with you. Another important factor is the fact that you can drive, as long as your disease is under medical control. You should inform your family members, your close friends and any other people you get in touch with about your disease and you should teach them about how they can help you in the case of an attack. There are a few things which a person who assists at an Epilepsy attack can do: he must remain calm, he should help the sufferer to lie down on one side and support his head, he should move the sharp objects away, he should permanently talk to the sufferer and he should carefully observe what is happening, in order to be able to describe it later.