KARACHI, June 17: Epilepsy can be managed well, if timely diagnosed and treated with regular medication, and a patient can live normal life without any difficulty after recovery.

This was stated by Dr Shaukat Ali, Head, Neurology department, JPMC, in a 'continuing medical education' programme, organized to update family physicians and general practitioners on epilepsy, at a hotel on Thursday.

In his lecture on "Management of Epilepsy," he said that there was no harm in marrying an epilepsy patient, if treated properly. He observed that epilepsy was a common neurological disorder and about 50 million people were suffering from this disease worldwide.

He said that in partial seizures, discharge remained localized, in generalized seizures, epileptic discharge started in middle-line and spread to all areas, while in secondary generalized seizures, discharge focal-spread to middle line and then became generalized.

He also informed the audience about the classification of seizure types. He said that seizure history, medical history, circumstances, precipitant, timings and duration of seizures were important in diagnosis of the disease.

"Trail treatment is also important in management of epilepsy," he added. Discussing principles of drug treatment, he said that single-drug therapy, slow introduction, titrate dose and compliance were necessary for effective treatment of the disease, while the choice of drug depended on seizure type, side effects and its cost.

"Five per cent of all normal children in the age group from 6 months to 5 years, receive simple febrile convulsions, and duration of fits is about 5 minutes, so parents do not need to be worried," he said, advising the parents that they should contact a doctor, as it should not reoccur with growth of children.

He also emphasized on counselling of all family members during the treatment of an epilepsy patient. Dr Ali said that epilepsy was a treatable disease but its treatment was lengthy. New medicines were available with better results, but taking regular medication and proper diagnosis were very important. -PPI