Dear Friends:
    I have permission from Cathy to share this post with you. It is slightly
off-topic; however, it is the result of a post I made about a mother being
advised to wean because the physician told her that the "baby was sucking all the
Tegretol out of her through the milk" and that she should wean.
    The information is current and interesting.
    warmly,
    Nikki


I join you in screaming re: your mom with epilepsy who weaned due to her
doctor's ignorant advice.

One thing FYI:  Petit mal and grand mal are no longer used to identify
seizures.  Petit mal usually signified what is now called absence seizures
(pronounced ab-SAHNCE).  THe new terminology is: absence: short lapses of consciousness
caused by a generalized (full brain) seizure;  simple partial:  a seizure
that does not affect consciousness and starts and remains localized in the brain;
complex partial:  a seizure that starts and remains localized in the brain
but does affect consciousness; tonic-clonic- the old grand mal- a convulsive
seizure that starts out with a whole body stiffening and ends with rhythmic
shaking of the entire body, and almost always includes unconsciousness during and
for a short time after the seizure.  There are other types too, but those are
the most common.

Why is this important?  Well, tegretol makes absence seizures worse.  So if
your client actually had an absence seizure, she is on the wrong med.  If she
had a simple partial seizure or complex partial, then it's the right drug.
If we can use the current terminology, we all know what each other is talking
about.  Now, I'm sure she is the one who used the term petit mal, because
that's what they were using when she was first diagnosed.

Thanks for letting me spout off,
Cathy, involuntary expert on epilepsy via my 14 year old daughter.

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