ABSTRACT
This chapter explains that the themed presentation encourages quick, focused study and detailed answers aid comprehension and encourages familiarity with epilepsy with essential diagrams, colour images and sample MRIs. For generalised tonic-clonic seizures only, lamotrigine or sodium valproate is usually the first-line treatment. However, in women planning to conceive, it is safer to use lamotrigine rather than sodium valproate, as the latter has a significantly higher risk of teratogenic side effects to the unborn child. The seizures start around the somato-motor area of the brain (also known as the Rolandic area) just anterior to the central sulcus of the brain. For this reason, patients can experience unilateral facial symptoms, oropharyngolaryngeal symptoms such as numbness and tingling inside the mouth, anarthria (inability to talk) and hypersalivation.
