Epileptic Nurse

[Angelita14]

Hi,
After being diagnosed with partial seizures, I'm awaiting an appointment with my Neurologist who I see anyway for migraines. 'If' he refers me to the Epilepsy Clinic, what am I to expect? I mean what do they do there exactly? I always thought the Neuro dealt with seizures etc. Any tips or advice would be helpful. Thanks.

 

[Cint]

A neurologist is a doctor who deals with disorders of the nervous system. So other than just epilepsy, he/she deals with numerous things like migraines, MS, Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, strokes, etc. If you are referred to an Epilepsy Clinic, they will probably do a more thorough investigation to find where you seizure are stemming from, starting with an EEG or a VEEG or an MRI. A dr. who specializes in epilepsy is an Epileptologist, which is who I see.

 

[masterjen]

An epileptologist (who I imagine you will be seeing at the Epilepsy Clinic) specializes in just epilepsy. A general neurologist does not have the same degree of focused training or focused clinical experience in epilepsy as does an epileptologist. A neurologist needs to know about strokes, parkinson's, MS, Huntington's, head injury, peripheral neuropathy, and everything else neurological; pretty difficult to become an expert in just one area. On the other hand most epileptologists have at least another 2 years of training/clinical research experience in just epilepsy, on top of their general neurology training, and their clinical practice is focused on epilepsy, so you can imagine how much knowledge and experience they must have accumulated through such concentrated work in one area of neurology.
Seeing an epileptologist is "the" way to go, in my opinion, and based on my experience.

 

[arnie]

Here's my 2 cents:

http://www.coping-with-epilepsy.com/forums/f23/get-thee-epileptologist-23319/

Onward!

 

[Angelita14]

Wow, thanks Arnie. I didn't realise just how different the job roles were! That's certainly opened my eyes.