Epilepsy is curable disorder: expert

Epilepsy is curable disorder: expert

Staff Reporter

National Epilepsy Day is celebrated each year on November 17

TIRUCHI: In some rural pockets of the district people with abnormal behaviour are still thought as being possessed by spirits or under the spell of `Satan.' When a person is in an acute state of fits he or she is taken to sorcerers, who burn the person's skin with a hot needle or iron rod.

Normal people tend to keep away from epileptics under the misconception that epilepsy is communicable. Stigmatised families keep epileptic members indoors or admit them to lunatic asylums thinking they are mad. There is also a belief that epileptics are impotent and should not marry. In their desperation to find a cure families resort to bizarre practices such as making the persons affected wear metal rings called `thayath' or eat the flesh of crows.

"All myths," says M.A. Aleem, consultant neurologist and epileptologist. According to Dr. Aleem, an assistant professor at K.A.P. Viswanatham Government Medical College Hospital, it is this fear and misunderstanding that forces people with epilepsy into withdrawal.

National Epilepsy Day, celebrated each year on November 17, is an occasion to realise that epilepsy is a neurological disorder and can be easily treated with medication. The magnitude of this ailment is the same as diabetes and hypertension. In fact, there is no danger of epileptic patients passing on the medical condition to their offspring, says Dr. Aleem. The doctor has trained at the Institute of Neurology, London, with sponsorship from the Indian Academy of Neurology.

Statistics

In Tiruchi district alone 60 to 70 new cases of epilepsy are detected in every one lakh population every year. As high as 69 per cent of epilepsy patients were given traditional treatment or administered faith healing methods once or many times during the period of their disease. From the segment of people who had had their first fit 43% were administered traditional treatment in our district and only 10 to 20 per cent given proper medical treatment, informed Dr. Aleem. He based his conclusion on researches on epilepsy-affected people in the district. According to World Health Organisation statistics 80 per cent of the 50 million people with epilepsy live in the developing countries. People who have had at least one seizure constitute 100 million and in South-East Asia alone 1 per cent of the population, comprising 15 million people, is believed to be epileptic.

The dismal picture in India's case shows that of 5 million epilepsy-affected people 74 per cent, constituting 4.1 million persons, will not receive standard treatment owing to misconceptions.

There is an urgent need to sensitise families of such patients to the medical nature of epilepsy, its characteristics, causes, and prognosis, in addition to the facts on compliance in treatment, potential side effects of drugs and duration of the treatment, said Dr. Aleem. He insisted that the services of communication specialists, community leaders and schoolteachers should be utilised to develop educational materials.



Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Monday, Nov 14, 2005