It was no way for an 11-year-old to live. For a month the boy had endured daily episodes of uncontrollable jerking and foaming at the mouth, and his physicians at Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital were concerned that the boy had epilepsy. Before starting the boy on a lifetime of anti-seizure medications, though, they turned to an unconventional diagnostic tool: hypnosis.

Scientists have discovered that mice genetically engineered to lack a particular protein in the brain have profound deafness and seizures. The finding suggests a pathway, they say, for exploring the hereditary causes of deafness and epilepsy in humans.

Asking patients with focal epilepsy (also known as partial seizures, which usually involve focal areas of the body and altered consciousness) how often they have seizures does not appear to provide an accurate count, according to a report in the November issue of Archives of Neurology, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.

A guideline developed by the American Academy of Neurology recommends immediate brain CT scans to screen certain emergency room patients with seizures. Evidence shows such scans can help doctors select the right treatment option.

Scientists still do not know what causes epileptic seizures, but researchers from Melbourne’s Howard Florey Institute are one step closer to solving this puzzle with the help of their newly developed genetically modified epileptic mouse.

The epilepsy drug lamotrigine is effective in controlling partial seizures when taken once a day as an added therapy, according to a study published in the October 16, 2007, issue of Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology.

A small device implanted in the skull that detects oncoming seizures, then delivers a brief electrical stimulus to the brain to stop them is under study at the Medical College of Georgia.

Mice genetically engineered to have a disease like Alzheimer’s have “silent” seizures that appear related to cellular changes involving the excess accumulations of the protein amyloid beta, said researchers from the Gladstone Institute of Neurological Disease and Baylor College of Medicine in a report that appears in today’s issue of the journal Neuron.

When your body cranks up the heat, it’s a sign that something’s wrong—and a fever is designed to help fight off the infection. But turning up the temperature can have a down side: in about one in 25 infants or small children, high fever can trigger fever-induced (febrile) seizures.

An implanted stimulator being studied at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital may be able to predict and prevent seizures before they start in people with uncontrolled epilepsy.

Bright light that flickers frequently or rapidly, like a strobe light, can trigger seizures in some people – a phenomenon documented in nearly 700 children who were hospitalized in Japan 10 years ago after watching a Pokemon cartoon.

An enzyme involved in the formation of the amyloid-beta protein associated with Alzheimer's disease can also alter the mechanism by which signals are transmitted between brain cells, the disruption of which can cause seizures.