Epilepsy surgery will be offered to more patients at Akademiska

The number of children who underwent surgery varied. Last year there were five children and we expect to double the business next year. It's a long period of care, anywhere from seven to 14 days if you include the investigation, including long-term video EEG recording, surgery and aftercare, says Christina Rosengren-Forsblad, MD, chief medical officer of the Pediatric Epilepsy Team. Academic Children's Hospital.

The decision on highly specialized national care means just that Surgical examination and treatment of epilepsy Both for children and adults They are concentrated in the Academic Hospital, Sahlgrenska University Hospital in Gothenburg, and Skane University Hospital in Lund.

– For our Department of Pediatric Neurology, the approval means that we are strengthening our position as one of the leading pediatric epilepsy centers in the country with complete epilepsy care, taking care of everything from benign, uncomplicated pediatric epilepsies to the most serious pediatric epilepsies, some She confirms that these cases require epilepsy surgery.

In order to meet the increasing influx of patients, two rooms in the care ward within the Academic Children's Hospital were renovated and modernized. The building will open on June 17. According to Christina Rosengren-Forsblad, international standards for investigation and monitoring are hereby met.

In Sweden, about 81,000 people are diagnosed with epilepsy, and about 5,500 people develop the disease every year, including 1,500 children. Epilepsy can begin at any time in life, and for many it means a lifelong illness that requires treatment that affects all aspects of life. Most people diagnosed can be successfully treated with medications aimed at reducing the risk of further attacks. In particularly severe epilepsy, surgical treatment may be considered after extensive investigations.

– In principle, all children undergoing surgery have a clear onset of seizures in one place in the brain and this is examined very carefully, often in several stages to reduce the risk of serious complications associated with the operation, explains Christina Rosengren. Forsblad continues:

– It could be a deviation from birth, or a scar after an injury or infection, which has been shown to be capable of causing severe epilepsy. The purpose of the investigation is to be clear about exactly where to start and to be able to assess that there is no risk that the patient will, for example, lose language or motor skills in an unreasonable way in the event of surgery. The goal of epilepsy surgery is seizure freedom.

In the surgical treatment of epilepsy, the trend has been toward minimally invasive surgery; Smaller interventions with equally good results which mean shorter treatment times, reduced risk of complications, etc.

– In the past, the skull was always open in principle and the goal was to operate on parts of the brain that were judged to be epileptic foci. This is still done today if necessary depending on the underlying cause. She concluded that today we have greater opportunities to perform minimally invasive surgery, which involves smaller holes through the skull and the placement of small, thin electrodes with many contact surfaces that can be used to burn the epileptic focus.

Facts: Epilepsy surgery Academic hospital

• Many different epilepsy surgeries are performed here, such as amygdala resection and hippocampal resection.
• Epilepsy surgery is designed based on the findings of the investigation. This can include traditional open surgery or less invasive interventions using targeted heat techniques (laser interstitial thermotherapy/thermocoagulation).
• Operations are often performed in a hybrid MRI room, which is an operating room where the patient can be scanned with an MRI during an ongoing procedure, which increases the accuracy of the procedure and reduces the risk of having to undergo another operation.
• The academic hospital was the first in Sweden to perform deep brain stimulation (DBS) in severe epilepsy.
• Research on epilepsy and epilepsy surgery is carried out here in cooperation with other hospitals, mainly Sahlgrenska University Hospital and Skåne University Hospital.
• The Epilepsy Surgery Team at the Academic Hospital regularly discusses its patients in rounds with colleagues at the Nigarda Hospital in Milan, which is one of the leading epilepsy surgery centers in Europe and also participates in other European collaborations regarding epilepsy surgery.