PAHO Caribbean educates public about Epilepsy

PAHO (Pan American Health Organization) Caribbean shares the measures that can provide support in controlling Epilepsy as part of World Epilepsy Day.

13th of February 2024

PAHO Caribbean educates public about Epilepsy, credits to Facebook

Caribbean: PAHO (Pan American Health Organization) Caribbean shares the measures that can provide support in controlling Epilepsy as part of World Epilepsy Day.

Epilepsy is one of the most common neurological disorders which can be treated with appropriate anti-seizure medicines. Also, this disease is not contagious. This affects people of all ages.

Considerably, almost 50 million of the population globally suffer from this disease. When considering the records, it has come forward that 80% of the people suffering from epilepsy live in countries with low and middle income.

Epilepsy is even characterized as recurrent seizures. Seizures are sudden, uncontrolled bursts of electrical activity in the brain. Such an issue can cause changes in behaviour, movements, feelings and consciousness levels.

“Epilepsy can be treated.” With this, it has come forward that up to 70% of people living with Epilepsy could live seizure-free if properly diagnosed and treated. The disease includes several of the causes which may include low birth weight or trauma during birth. Many others that can be included in it are:

Brain tumour
Head injury
Brain infections like neurocysticercosis, meningitis
Genetic Syndromes

This can be cured with the intake of anti-seizure medicines. Discontinuing these can be considered after 2 years without seizures and should be taken into account as clinical, social, and personal factors.

It is commonly heard that prevention is better than cure, so for prevention, one can go for regular checkups and keep a check on blood pressure levels, diabetes and obesity. Avoiding the use of tobacco and excessive alcohol.

Moreover, the disease also increases the risk of premature death. This increases up to three times higher than the general public. Even people from low-income countries do not get the treatment.

Such unavailability of treatment has raised concerns among people about the risk factors of the disease and how serious it can become at a point in time.