What type of Epilepsy do you have?

What type of epilepsy do you have?

  • Symptomatic epilepsy

    Votes: 3 33.3%

  • Cryptogenic epilepsy

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • Idiopathic epilepsy

    Votes: 6 66.7%
  • Total voters
    9

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Mav455

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Symptomatic epilepsy – when the symptoms of epilepsy are due to damage or disruption to the brain.
Cryptogenic epilepsy – when no evidence of damage to the brain can be found, but other symptoms, such as learning difficulties, suggest that damage to the brain has occurred.
Idiopathic epilepsy – when no obvious cause for epilepsy can be found.

I have Photosensitive Epilepsy, Idiopathic, was diagnosed 2 years ago
 
Just a cautionary note -- Many neurologists use those terms in very specialized ways that differ from the above:

Symptomatic epilepsy: Caused by an identifiable lesion, tumor, or metabolic defect.
Cryptogenic epilepsy: Undetermined by any tests, but probably caused by some sort of lesion.
Idiopathic epilepsy: Genetic in origin.

Most of here use "idiopathic" in it's very general sense ("of unknown cause or origin") -- and that's what I voted. But a neurologist would probably call my epilepsy "cryptogenic" -- no identifiable lesion, syndrome, or trauma, and no genetic cause, only an unverifiable guess that a head injury when I was 5 led to seizures 30 years later.
 
I don't really know. I did have pituitary tumors and multiple surgeries to remove them. But my seizures started decades before and the Neurologist doesn't say they are from that.
 
Hmm tricky one for me too :ponder:

My neurologist would class it as symptomatic- a complication of encephalitis, all nice and tidy.

Thing is, there wasn't a swelling of the brain- just a t-c/status, coma, brain damage, and no legions etc have ever been found.

So I'm going for idiopathic/cryptogenic (non-photosensitive) as well because I don't think 'possibly caught a virus by buying tropical fruit at the market' really cuts it as a valid medical hypothesis :P

Sadly, I bet idiopathic will be the run-away winner here...
 
I am guessing mine would be "Symptomatic epilepsy." It started from Arteriovenous Malformation or AVM in my left temporal lobe. After the AVM was removed, the seizures continued. So reading the three types above, I am not certain just which one my seizures come from...
 
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