Sudden Unexpected Death in Epilepsy (SUDEP) is defined as the death of an otherwise healthy person with epilepsy that occurs either after a seizure or even when there is no recent seizure activity. Risk factors for SUDEP include having epilepsy for a long period of time, having drug-resistant generalized tonic-clonic seizures, and having seizures at…
The most common seizures in adults are complex partial seizures, which often start at the sides of the brain – regions known as the temporal lobes. These seizures are very hard to control with standard anti-seizure drugs. Preclinical evidence from animal models show that cannabidiol (CBD) – the extract in medical marijuana that doesn’t make…
During Phase 2, EpLink began a partnership with industry experts at Avertus Inc. to further innovation and commercial opportunities that can directly benefit the epilepsy community. Engineers at Avertus developed a wireless headset that a person with epilepsy can wear comfortably to monitor their brain waves using electroencephalography (EEG). This information is then sent directly to a…
To better understand the genetic changes that may lead to the development of seizures, EpLink researchers were involved in multiple projects in Phase 2. For example, findings from Dr. Berge Minassian and team show that a change in theSCN1A gene (also known as a ‘genetic mutation’) was linked to the development of Dravet Syndrome, a…
Treatment of depression ranks among the top five research priorities for people with epilepsy. While depression is a common co-morbidity in people with epilepsy, Dr. McIntyre Burnham’s lab found that seizures themselves did not cause “depression-like” behaviour in animal studies. In other research, Dr. Kathryn Hum and colleagues compared two educational telephone-based programs called UPLIFT…
Seizure surgery is a potential treatment option for people who have focal seizures – seizures that are localized to one area of the brain. However, Dr. Jorge Burneo and colleagues at Western University found that in Ontario, seizure surgery is an extremely underused treatment option and many people with epilepsy are not referred for surgery.…
The ketogenic diet (KD) is a low-fat, high-carbohydrate diet and has been proven to be effective for managing seizures. For children, the KD is typically started in the hospital for safety reasons. This means that the child must wait for a hospital bed to become available, and must spend time away from home. Research by…
The epileptic encephalopathies (EE), also known as epilepsy syndromes, are severe seizure disorders that start in childhood. The seizures are often frequent and drug-resistant, and they are associated with progressive impairment of the child’s cognition. There are a number of different epileptic encephalopathies, including West Syndrome, Dravet Syndrome, Lennox-Gastaut Syndrome, Doose Syndrome and Landau-Kleffner Syndrome…
The Brain Monitoring and Modulation group aims to develop approaches/technologies that monitor and change brain activity to stop seizures. Monitoring activities address the fundamental problem of how to localize and detect seizure activity using scalp electroencephalography (EEG) and intracranial EEG (iEEG). This theme includes both clinical and pre-clinical studies. Pre-clinical research studies include the development…
About 70% of epilepsies have a genetic basis. Some are single‐gene epilepsies, some have a polygenic etiology, while others have genetic modifying factors. So far, only 15% of genes associated with epilepsy have been identified. Thus, epilepsy is in large part a genetic disease, and future treatments for epilepsy could involve corrective genetic modification. Using…
