Determine whether a person is sick with epilepsy and howit is a species that can only be a psychiatrist or a neurologist. Do not try to make a diagnosis yourself or close. This is too serious. There are many more harmless disorders that an inexperienced person can confuse with epilepsy. Therefore, differential diagnosis is the first thing that the attending physician will think about. What are epileptic seizures and the disease in general? What do relatives of the afflicted need to know?
Epileptic seizures rarely occur indoctor's office. Therefore, the "testimony" will help the psychiatrist to understand what is happening and to make the correct diagnosis. So if you have seen a relative epilepsy attack, be sure to tell the doctor everything in detail. Your observation can greatly help the patient.
Not epilepsy, but diabetes?
Anyone who has experienced a seizure orsomething like him should be asked for help. If people say that you were unconscious for some time or lost control of yourself, you cannot ignore their opinion. You may not be sick at all, and epileptic seizures are not about you. For example, there are episodes of loss of consciousness in people with diabetes.
With a support group
Do not go to the doctor alone.Even if you remember everything about your condition, there is always a chance that loved ones have seen more and they will be able to give specific information to the doctor. They may remember what happened before the seizure and what followed. Man himself can not always remember all these features, but they are very important.
Questions of the doctor
An epileptic seizure may beprovoked by a lack of sleep, alcohol or drugs. And it will not be an epileptic syndrome, but a completely different state. The doctor will also ask under what circumstances the seizure occurred, how long it lasted, whether it started immediately after the person got up from a sitting position, if it was once in a lifetime, if the patient was treated by other specialists, and what medicines he took. I felt exhausted or confused after the attack. All these details are very significant.
Objective research
The brain must be examined with the help of the MRI machine,This will exclude such phenomena as a tumor or an infectious disease of the nervous system. Because in these cases, antiepileptic drugs will be useless. They also make an encephalogram, which shows whether there is a violation of brain activity, thus revealing a tendency to seizures.
What do bouts look like?
Epileptic seizures areconvulsions with loss of consciousness or without it. At the same time, before the beginning, a dimming of consciousness appears, called an aura. During it, a person may experience various kinds of deceptions of feelings. With a serious attack, a coma can develop, the person turns pale, a little later the skin may even turn blue. Does not react to others. After an attack, amnesia often develops, which is why only an outsider can help in the diagnosis.
Epilepsy is a formidable diagnosis. But for many, with adequate treatment, a seizure happens only once. The patient enjoys life and is not afraid of the future.
