Epilepsy is a neurological disorder that affects the brain and causes seizures. People with epilepsy often face stigma, simply because the general public isn’t educated. Fortunately, you can learn about epilepsy with a search online right now.
Many still believe that people with epilepsy shouldn’t be allowed to drive or have jobs where they operate machinery — and it’s these people whose lack of knowledge keeps these false rumors alive. Here are epilepsy facts you may not know.
How is Epilepsy Diagnosed?
People are usually diagnosed with epilepsy after suffering more than one seizure that was not caused by a medication or another condition. Seizures can vary in intensity from long bouts of convulsions to practically undetectable, brief episodes that are almost completely unnoticeable.
No one is 100 percent sure what causes epilepsy. Some cases are caused by traumatic brain injuries, low oxygen levels at birth, and genetic conditions. However, a large percentage of epileptics remain unaware of what caused their disorder. Roughly 50 million people worldwide have been diagnosed with epilepsy and 80 percent of those cases have been discovered in the developed world.
Epilepsy Cause Different Types of Seizures
There are a wide variety of different types of seizures that people with epilepsy experience.
In its broadest definition, a seizure is an episode that affects the electrical signals of the brain, causing a disturbance. These electrical surges that disturb the brain have a variety of affects on the person undergoing the seizure. Often, people fall to the floor and convulse, but just as often seizures manifest in small, unnoticeable behavioral changes. Many people with epilepsy find that with medication, they can manage their seizures and take back control of their lives.
And while seizures caused by epilepsy are clearly dangerous, the risk of death due to epileptic seizure is quite low. Only about 1 in every 1,000 epileptics will die from Sudden Unexpected Death in Epilepsy (SUDEP). Epileptics who get help immediately upon seizing are very unlikely to suffer complications.
Typically, death occurs when a seizure is not managed correctly. Some common examples include choking on vomit or other fluid, or drowning if the seizure happens in water. Epileptics are also vulnerable to injuries like burns, or cuts and bruises, due to unexpectedly hitting the ground during a seizure.
There Are Different Types of Epilepsy
Typically, if the average person knows anything about epilepsy, it’s that people with the disorder suffer from seizures. What they don’t know is that there are many different types of epilepsy.
Each diagnosis is made by looking at the different factors and patterns of the patient’s seizures. These different factors include time of day, which parts of the brain are involved in the seizure, how the seizure is triggered, and genetic information, among many others. The type of epilepsy will also determine which medication and treatment will be most effective in helping to mitigate seizures.
Is Epilepsy Contagious?
There are people who believe that epilepsy is contagious. However, this is nothing but a misconception.
Epilepsy is not contagious. Perhaps people think that epilepsy is contagious because the cause of the disorder is still largely unknown. In addition, most types of epilepsy are not hereditary. The vast majority of the different types of epilepsy, especially in older people, are caused by traumatic events like tumors and strokes.
How Is Epilepsy Treated?
Modern medicine is truly remarkable. As many as six out of every 10 epileptics find that they are completely seizure-free when they work with their doctor to find the right dosage of anticonvulsant medication.
Usually, a person who has had two unprovoked seizures will be given the medication as a precaution, with the idea that they will take it for their entire life unless the diagnosis can be disproven. For people who are high risk, medication is often given after the first seizure in an effort to begin treatment as soon as possible.
With medication, many people find that they are able to eradicate seizures from their lives.
What’s the Best Way to Handle a Seizure?
If someone around you has just gone into a tonic-clonic seizure (the medical term for the type of intense, convulsive seizure most often seen in movies), the best thing to do is to roll them on to their side into the recovery position, and pillow their head with something soft. This allows them to seize in a way that’s the least damaging to their body. Make sure to watch them to ensure they aren’t aspirating vomit, and that any fluid is draining from their mouth or nose on to the floor.
While it may feel like a person having a seizure in front of you is a big deal, it’s important to consider the mitigating circumstances before calling an ambulance. A seizure is only considered a medical emergency if it goes on for longer than 5 minutes, or if the person has multiple seizures one right after the other without regaining consciousness in between.
However, if you are unsure of the person’s medical history, calling 911 is never a bad idea to receive help from an expert, even if it’s just support over the phone.
Avoid Trying to Stop a Seizure in Progress
Outdated research once suggested trying to restrain an epileptic person undergoing a seizure. While it may have been done with the best of intentions, this is no longer recommended.
The best thing to do is to remove any obstructions from the person’s reach, and allow the seizure to run its course. There’s nothing you can do to stop it. As well, it is no longer recommended to attempt to insert anything into a person’s mouth while they are seizing. This used to be standard practice (as a way to try and avoid the person biting their own tongue), but is now considered a choking hazard.
Epilepsy Isn’t Linked to Stress
This used to be a common belief as well. Many people associated epilepsy with too much stress, and thought that by removing the individual from a stressful situation, they could curtail their seizures. While it would be nice to think that curtailing stress has a positive affect on a person’s epilepsy and seizures, unfortunately there just isn’t the research to back this up.
Currently, doctors suggest that avoiding stressful situations is helpful in general for people with epilepsy, they just haven’t seen it specifically reduce the frequency or intensity of seizures.
Is Epilepsy the Only Triggers for Seizures?
Seizures can be triggered by many different things. Each different type of epileptic syndrome has its own specific triggers, and many people find that over the course of their lifetime, they are able to learn what specific triggers affect them the most. Seizures can be triggered by minor disturbances like lack of sleep or even alcohol consumption, but often are the result of more complicated hormonal imbalances in the brain.