Anyone can develop epilepsy. Seizures start for the first time in people over age 65 almost as often as they do in children. Seizures in the elderly are often the aftereffect of other health problems like stroke and heart disease.

• Antiepileptic Drugs (AEDs) – medication used to control seizures, also called anticonvulsants
• Aura – a warning period at the beginning of a seizure that may cause a feeling of fear/doom or strange sensations such as an odd smell, taste, nausea, or palpitations. This is actually part of a focal aware seizure.  It is possible for focal impaired awareness or secondarily generalized tonic-clonic seizures to begin seconds or minutes after.
• Automatism – purposeless, automatic & involuntary movements during a seizure, such as chewing, lip-smacking, picking at clothing or wandering around confused. This may occur during focal impaired awareness & absence seizures.
• Catamenial Epilepsy -the tendency for seizures to occur around the time of menstruation
• Corpus Callosum – a broad band of nerve fibers joining the two hemispheres of the brain
• CT/CAT Scan – Computed Tomography/Computerized Axial Tomography- a scanning technique which uses x-rays & computers to produce images of the structure of the brain to help detect abnormalities
• EEG – electroencephalogram- a diagnostic test which records the brain’s electrical activity or “brain waves”. It does not provide a diagnosis of epilepsy but it can help distinguish types of seizures and/or where they begin in the brain.
• Epileptogenic Zone – a cortical region of the brain that, when stimulated, produces spontaneous seizures or auras
• Epileptologist – a neurologist with specialty training in epilepsy
• Idiopathic – used to describe an epileptic seizure of unknown cause, as opposed to seizures caused by an identifiable problem in the brain
• Intractable – difficult to alleviate or remedy; for example, intractable seizures are difficult to control with the usual antiepileptic drug therapy
• Ketogenic Diet – a high fat, low carbohydrate, low protein diet used to control seizures in children
• Partial Seizures – synonymous with focal seizures, in which the seizure starts in one part of the brain
• PET Scan – Positron Emission Tomography- a diagnostic test that uses a very low and safe dose of a radioactive compound to measure metabolic activity in the brain. It is helpful in planning epilepsy surgery.
• Post-ictal or Postictal – the minutes, hours or days of abnormal consciousness, confusion or sleepiness after a seizure, during which the brain is recovering and returning to normal function
• Refractory Epilepsy – when a person has failed to become (and stay) seizure free with adequate trials of two seizure medications (antiepileptic drugs/AEDs)
• Responsive Neurostimulation (RNS) System– a new approach to treating medically uncontrolled partial onset seizures. This device placed in the skull provides responsive neurostimulation that automatically monitors brain signals and provides stimulation to abnormal electrical brain events.
• Status-Epilepticus – a prolonged seizure- usually defined as lasting longer than 30 minutes in a focal seizure or 5 minutes in a tonic-clonic seizure- or a series of repeated seizures; a continuous state of seizure activity, most common with tonic-clonic, but may occur in almost any seizure type. This can be life-threatening and requires immediate emergency care.
• Threshold – the brain’s susceptibility to having a seizure. Antiepileptic drugs raise this threshold and make a person less likely to have a seizure. In contrast, lack of sleep, fever, and other factors can lower the threshold and make seizures more likely.
• Vagus Nerve Stimulator (VNS) – a surgically implanted generator placed in the chest that sends regular, mild pulses of electrical energy to the brain through the vagus nerve. In some cases it has been effective in decreasing seizure activity.