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Bayfront Institute of Neurosciences Comprehensive Epilepsy Program |
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Diagnosis and Treatment Q: What causes epilepsy and how is it diagnosed?
A: There are many possible causes of epilepsy, including: severe head injury, stroke, brain tumor, an abnormal collection of blood vessels in the brain, birth trauma, brain infection, or malformed regions of the brain.
The Comprehensive Epilepsy Program utilizes the most advanced diagnostic technology to classify and determine the cause of the seizure or epilepsy. Bayfront offers: · Digital, long-term, video-EEG monitoring and a dedicated in-hospital unit for around-the-clock evaluation. · Epilepsy protocol high-resolution MRI (magnetic resonance imaging) ·
· PET scan (positron emission tomography) · Subtraction Ictal SPECT (single photon emission computed tomography) · Magnetic Source Imaging (through the University of Alabama, Birmingham) · Magnetic Resonance Spectroscopy
Q: What are treatment options?
A: Medical intervention or drug therapy is successful in approximately 70 percent of people with epilepsy. In the last decade, several new anti-epileptic medications have been developed, giving persons with epilepsy more treatment options with fewer side effects. Bayfront’s epilepsy team instructs patients on how to use new medications, create new medication formulas and how to improve the effectiveness of drugs. Many patients have newfound success with medications after meeting with the specialized staff at Bayfront’s Comprehensive Epilepsy Program.
Bayfront also offers patients the opportunity to participate in investigational drug trials of new epilepsy medications, giving them the advantage to be among the first to benefit from advancements in the field.
Surgical intervention is considered after two seizure medications fail to control a patient’s epilepsy (this condition is known as intractable epilepsy). According to a study in the New England Journal of Medicine, the success rate for becoming seizure-free with new medications is only five to 10 percent, when other medications have failed.
Approximately 30-35 percent of patients with intractable epilepsy do not become seizure-free with medications, and are at greater risk for reduced quality of life, injury, or sudden, unexplained death.
Epilepsy surgery is a highly effective, safe and accepted method of treatment for patients with refractory epilepsy. The New England Journal of Medicine reported that epilepsy surgery is more effective than medications in making intractable temporal lobe epilepsy patients seizure-free. In well-selected candidates, approximately 70-80 percent of patients can become seizure-free or have their seizures significantly reduced. As a Level IV epilepsy center, Bayfront is one of only a few hospitals nationwide that is qualified to offer epilepsy surgery. A comprehensive evaluation will determine if epilepsy surgery is an option. Vagal nerve stimulation is a treatment option for patients who are not candidates for surgery. A small device, similar to a pacemaker, is implanted and electrically stimulates the left vagus nerve in the neck. The device operates automatically to help prevent seizures, but the patient can also activate the device on their own if they feel a seizure coming on |
