I was diagnosed with epilepsy 16 years ago. My seizures have never been controlled with medication. Due to multiple focal points I did not qualify for brain surgery. My Neuro suggested the VNS and I decided to give it a shot. I had the surgery on 7/21/00. The device never helped my condition but I never regretted my decision, that is until 7/02/06 when the device malfunctioned and nearly killed me. On that date I started to experience what I thought was a new type of seizure. The episodes began with a sudden sharp pain in the throat followed by choking and then unconsciousness. I was not alarmed by this because I have several different types of seizures. My parents happened to stop by that Sunday morning for a visit. They realized that something was terribly wrong and called my Neuro and EMS. My last memory of that morning was being inside of the ambulance., when I regained consciousness I was in the ICU. What was actually happening is the device was stopping my heart (asystole) during the 30 second on cycles. Once my Neuro realized that the problem was cardiac in nature and not seizure activity he had to rush to his office to retrieve the equipment to deactivate the VNS. Once the device was turned off I regained a normal heart beat. My VNS was programmed at 30 sec/3 min and I experenced approx 40 episodes of asystole. I am a very lucky man to have survived that ordeal.
Dennis100
Dennis100