Older people suffer from epilepsy more and more

Experts predict that the rate of 1% of the elderly in the world with current epilepsy will increase, because the population is getting older. This is a brain disease, due to many different causes, there is a very complex disease and greatly affects the quality of life of patients.

Epilepsy although not life-threatening, but many patients experience complications and accidents when seizures occur such as: biting the tongue, pneumonia caused by inhalation or vomiting, traumatic fractures (common in the neck bone), brain damage caused by prolonged episodes causes the brain to lack oxygen; apnea due to airway obstruction .

Listen to a talk about health at the Ho Chi Minh City Women's Cultural House. ( Photo: ML)

There are many causes of epilepsy in older people. Statistics show that cerebrovascular disease is the leading cause of epilepsy (accounting for 44% of all cases), followed by brain tumors, head injuries, about 10% of seizures in older people is due to alcohol and tobacco addiction.

The most obvious manifestation of epilepsy is: spasticity and convulsions in the whole body - but only about 30% of patients have this manifestation - and many symptoms are difficult to identify such as loss of transient consciousness, feeling unusual taste, hallucinations, cognitive changes, even some mental signs. Symptoms of seizures are often caused by distant symptoms (due to prolonged illness) or by acute symptoms (due to head injury). There are also some cases where seizures can be caused by distant symptoms and acute symptoms.

Older people with epilepsy often have other conditions associated with neurodegenerative diseases, memory loss, cerebrovascular diseases, cancer . Therefore, the mortality rate from epilepsy is older people are quite high. So far, taking anti-epileptic drugs is still the main treatment. However, antiepileptic drugs also affect cognitive function and may cause some complications in the elderly. Because older patients often have many diseases, they should take many different drugs, so there is easy interaction between drugs. The use of medication must be indicated by a specialist.

For older people, seizures often cause body injuries, losing confidence and reducing the patient's independence. Therefore, they must be hospitalized or cared for in special centers. Like other diseases, epilepsy if detected early and treated properly, the ability to completely recover is very high. "Because this disease has many manifestations, many patients suffer from epilepsy for a long time but are not correctly diagnosed and treated properly," said Dr. Le Van Tuan, neuroscience lecturer at Hanoi Medical University. HCMC pharmacy said.

Hospital of Ho Chi Minh City University of Medicine and Pharmacy will coordinate with Sanofi Aventis Company to hold a seminar on "Epilepsy in the elderly" at 9:00 on April 22 at the University of Medicine and Pharmacy. People can contact phone number: 08-8224889 to register to attend.

Vo An