It is well-known that people with epilepsy commonly report difficulties with memory. What is not always accepted by doctors is that epilepsy could be the cause of the memory problems. “The prevalence of the memory impairment that goes along with epilepsy is under-recognised and under-appreciated,” says John Duncan, professor of neurology at University College, London, and medical director of the National Society for Epilepsy. “People often make light of it. I don't think there's any conspiracy; it's just what people have been taught. There can be many factors and it can be difficult to tease out the contribution of the different parts.”
Duncan believes that long-term memory loss can be caused by epilepsy, particularly if the seizures involve the temporal lobe (the part of the brain where memories are laid down). He describes a seizure as an abnormal firing of nerve cells. “It's like an excessive electrical discharge that burns out some of the wiring. Each seizure may knock out one nerve cell in 1,000, which wouldn't be obvious, but if someone over the course of years has hundreds of seizures, there would be a cumulative effect.”
