To what extent can drug treatment help in patients with epilepsy?
There has been a significant improvement in the drug treatment of epilepsy in the last few decades. The world wide experience is that complete control of seizures can be expected with appropriate drugs in almost 75% of newly diagnosed, previously untreated patients of epilepsy. The choice of drugs mainly depends on the type of seizures in a given patient. Drug treatment should only be started when the diagnosis of epilepsy has been established beyond doubt. To begin with it is always better to start with a single most appropriate drug (monotherapy). It is not recommended that patients should be started with two or more anti-epileptic drugs (polytherapy). The drug chosen is usually introduced gradually, in small doses because most drugs have some side effects if these are introduced rapidly. The final maintenance dose is usually built up over a period of a few weeks.
