Management of patients with epilepsy

2023-05-17
Wieslaw Oczkowski

Wieslaw Oczkowski, MD, is a professor emeritus in the Department of Medicine at McMaster University and director of the Regional Stroke Network for the Central South Ontario Region.

Could you please summarize the key advice for neurologists treating patients with drug-resistant epilepsy?

The management of patients with epilepsy is extremely complex. It’s not one disorder, it has multiple etiologies. It requires a complex evaluation of the patients themselves.

It also requires a good understanding of the use of the medications, their mechanisms of action, interactions, and so forth. It requires a multidisciplinary team, so the use of an epileptologist plus the community care partners, to fully be able to manage someone with a disorder which can be very refractory. In this way the patient will get the best care and most likely will be seizure free.

See also
  • Cannabinoids in patients with epilepsy What is the current place of cannabidiol and other cannabinoids in the treatment of epilepsy? How often are OTC cannabinoid preparations used by patients with epilepsy in North America? How does it affect the clinical management of epilepsy?
  • Novel antiseizure drugs as first-line treatment Novel antiseizure drugs are typically approved as adjunctive therapy, to be used as an add-on. It might take years until their registration is expanded to include initial monotherapy. Do you think that cenobamate and other novel drugs could reduce the rates of drug resistance when introduced earlier, even as first-line medications in selected patients?
  • Preventing medical readmissions: State of the art Dr Lauren Lapointe-Shaw comments on avoidable hospital admissions and opportunities to improve patient care.
  • Neurological emergencies: not to be missed A lecture by Dr Wieslaw Oczkowski, from McMaster University, Canada, delivered at McMaster International Review Course in Internal Medicine in Kraków in May 2017.

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