Epilepsy Treatment

Eva Florido: My son Frank was diagnosed at the age of 18, although he did have his first seizure at 14. His challenge was really accepting his condition and realizing that he would have to depend on other individuals for his rides to work and other things.

Frank Hernandez: Being diagnosed with epilepsy at the age of 18 brought a lot of limitations to a little bit more simple things in life as far as school, sleeping, driving, work even. As far as my education, it was definitely something that I had to go ahead and continuously cut short because I was spending more time in the doctor's office as opposed to class.

Eva Florido: As a mother, I just felt very distressed that they had not come up with any medication that would help calm his seizures. I actually heard a commercial about this technique that they were doing, the surgery, and once I heard the commercial, it really gave me hope, and that's where I was introduced to Dr. Ulloa.

Carol Ulloa, MD: So I'm very proud about our Comprehensive Epilepsy Center. I think that we're really passionate about treating patients with epilepsy and really giving them the best care possible. Our focus is epilepsy, and I think that really adds a certain degree of expertise.

Patrick Landazuri, MD: The first thing I think about is that so many patients don't really know what their diagnosis is. What they're often told is that they have a seizure disorder, which I think in some ways is akin to telling someone with a heart attack that they have chest pain. I mean, there are lots of reasons why people can have chest pain, and I think it's important for people to know why.

Dr. Landazuri: Similarly, there are lots of reasons why people can have seizures, and I think it's important for people to understand the cause of their seizures, and that's really their specific epilepsy diagnosis. I think when we're able to do that, we're able to offer them more specific treatments, things like surgery, which most often people have never heard of, and are very highly effective treatments.

Dr. Landazuri: By the time we see these patients, they've been on 7, 8, 9 medications, when the research pretty clearly indicates that after that third medicine, they have a less than 1% chance of being seizure-free.

Nancy Hammond, MD: I think there are several barriers that patients with epilepsy face when they're trying to get the best care. The first barrier is getting the correct diagnosis, so a lot of times people have strange things that happen to them and they're not entirely sure what's going on with them.

Caleb Pearson, PsyD: I think oftentimes when people think of epilepsy, they think of seizures, when actually there's a number of comorbidities that are seen with epilepsy, things like depression, anxiety. These are things that are often misdiagnosed or not diagnosed with people.

Dr. Ulloa: Living with epilepsy, living with having seizures affects your life, the lack of the ability to drive, sometimes the lack of being able to hold a job.

Frank Hernandez: I felt a lot more comforted because of a lot of the more progressive information that came from Dr. Ulloa.

Dr. Ulloa: If I could tell patients with epilepsy 1 thing, it would be that it's not OK for them to continue to have seizures. It's such a simple premise, but I think a lot of people really don't know that and don't understand that.

Dr. Hammond: There's always new treatments coming out, there's new medications coming out, and so if you have epilepsy and you're continuing to have seizures, you need to ask your doctor, "Is there something more I can do?" Because this is not OK. It's not OK to live with seizures.

Dr. Ulloa: So with that knowledge, then they will want to seek more information, and I feel like that's my primary job is to give patients as much information about their condition as I can.

Dr. Ulloa: Schedule your appointment with our comprehensive epilepsy team today by calling 913-588-1227.