Epilepsy causes thunderstorms in the brain

Epilepsy day is about to solve illness

05/10/2012

On the 5th of October, the Epilepsy Day will be held with numerous information events. The main topic this year is "epilepsy in early childhood", because these are often recognized late. Although epilepsy is as common as rheumatoid arthritis, few are aware of the sometimes bizarre seizures and what to do in such situations.

Around one percent of the population suffers from epilepsy
Thomas Porschen, chairman of the National Association for Epilepsy Self-help North Rhine -Westphalia, suffered for about 15 years in the recurrent seizures. He reports a tingling that reaches from the stomach to the left calf. "And then a fear spiral sets in, because you know exactly: the next attack is imminent." Porschen knows that people who are watching an epileptic seizure for the first time are often completely overwhelmed and scared. "They just did not know What they should do, "he told the news agency" dpa "about strangers who suddenly stood around him in his attacks and were frightened. But he actually needed someone, "who asks in a calm voice: Are you alright, are you all right?".

Inge Wertheim also reports shocked people, whom she looked into the face, after she was aware of a seizure for a short time. "Nobody understands that, who has not experienced it before." The 67-year-old is ashamed of her convulsions, "because then I lose control and even got myself wet. That's just embarrassing. "But Inge Wertheim does not give up. In the meantime, she and her neurologist have found medicines that prevent seizures. She has been symptom free for more than 14 months. "Now I finally dare to take a trip abroad. In the past, I was afraid of going to a hospital in a seizure where no one understands me because of the foreign language, "says the retiree.

Many still believe that epilepsy is a mental disability or limits the intelligence. Epilepsy is based on a dysfunction of the brain. "This may be a genetic disorder, a tumor, a craniocerebral injury from an accident or a stroke, and it may cause seizures," explains Thomas Mayer, Managing Director of the German Society for Epileptology against the "dpa". "Epilepsy is not to be understood as an isolated disease, but as a disease.

"Many patients are working in high-performance positions," adds Professor Christian Elger from the German Society for Neurology in Berlin. "However, if the cause of epileptic seizures limits the overall performance of the brain, there may be intellectual damage as well as seizures."

Epilepsy shows up in different seizure forms
Doctors only speak of epilepsy when several seizures have occurred within a certain period of time. "But even after a first attack, you would start with a therapy, if you find a high risk of incipient epilepsy," says Mayer. A seizure is like a thunderstorm of nerve cells in the brain that discharge uncontrollably. "This can start in a small area and spread over the entire brain," says the managing director of the German Society for Epileptology. There are seizures that last only seconds, in which the affected appears absent. Other epilepsy patients have perceptual disorders during seizure and show strange behaviors such as the sudden production of peculiar sounds. The seizures can also occur much stronger and last for several minutes. "Since the patients are quite stiff and develop enormous forces, they twitch rhythmically, are unconscious and fall to the ground, where they can partially fractures," Elger reports to the "dpa". "But that takes only a maximum of one and a half minutes. Sometimes it takes half an hour or more for those affected to reorganize. "Mayer's delay of five minutes or more, during which the person convulsing convulses, is to call the ambulance, as this may be a life-threatening seizure series.

Epilepsy is usually good with medications
As the National Association for Epilepsy Self-help North Rhine-Westphalia informed, the risk of epilepsy in the first years of life and from the age of 60 is particularly high. Affected people do not necessarily suffer from the disease for a lifetime. Often, it only affects one phase of life.

To diagnose epilepsy, the medical history is recorded and carried out by means of electroencephalogram (EEG) a measurement of brain waves. In addition, there are often imaging studies. As a rule, epilepsy patients receive anticonvulsant drugs called anticonvulsants, which do not cure the condition but can prevent seizures. "In about two-thirds of all patients, they have been shown to help prevent seizure," says Elger. The cause remains, however, so that "after a possible discontinuation of the drugs with high probability of new attacks, often with delays of up to a year and more" come. In rare, particularly severe cases, surgical procedures are also performed.

Those affected especially find the unpredictability of seizures particularly restrictive of their lives. A so-called epilepsy emergency card, which patients always carry with them, helps many to alleviate their fears. "When people with severe epilepsy carry it with them, they feel safer and dare to get back on the street," says Porschen.

Patients with epilepsy are also often confronted with the concerns and well-intentioned advice of relatives and acquaintances, although most wish to be treated as normal. "For that they have to make their environment clear: please do not restrict me, I know exactly where my limits lie," explains Porschen. (Ag)

Read also about epilepsy:
Deciphering the development of epilepsy
Epilepsy: strong increase in expenditure
Mechanism of brain development decoded