How you've helped
We couldn’t have done it without you...
Every day 75 people are diagnosed with epilepsy. With the generosity of our supporters we are able to provide the support, information and medical services they need and offer hope for the future through our medical research. We would like to thank all of our supporters for enabling us to provide these vital services.
We want to build on all that we achieved last year. Here are just a few of the things that our supporters helped us to accomplish:
Research
We continued to take the lead on a number of research projects:
- We looked at the genetic basis of susceptibility to epilepsy and how people with epilepsy respond to treatment
- Epilepsy Society’s therapeutic drug monitoring lab was transferred from UCLH to the Epilepsy Society site and we continued analysing the effects of new drugs
- Epilepsy Society’s medical director Professor John Duncan used the most advanced scanners to find parts of the brain causing seizures that had previously eluded the best of scans
- Planning permission was granted for a £4.5 million clinical research facility
- We purchased an ocular tomography machine to identify those people whose eyesight would be affected by specific AEDs
- Going forward we will also continue research in the areas of drug resistance, neuro-electronic devices, epidemiology and brain imaging
Memory training
The development of a memory training programme has been aimed to help people with epilepsy cope with memory loss. This programme will ultimately assess whether memory training can offset the decline in memory that often occurs as a consequence of temporal lobe surgery.
Information resources
Our Epilepsy Information Service (EIS) produced a new Seizure Diary and updated our information leaflets ‘Driving and Travel’ and ‘Employment and Employer’s guide’. EIS also increased the distribution of our information leaflets by placing them in over 6,000 GP surgeries and 1,000 pharmacies. Our confidential epilepsy helpline was awarded the Quality Assurance mark from the Telephone Helpline Association in 2008.
Schools Awareness Programme
Our schools awareness programme went from strength to strength, speaking to over 20,000 children. Our programme gave them the chance to learn more about epilepsy with the aim of reducing stigma, so improving lives for those young people and children who have the condition.
Online forum
We continued to provide a free online forum for people affected by epilepsy to connect with others in a similar situation. People discuss all aspects of their life with epilepsy, from issues around sleep, employment and driving to epilepsy diagnosis, medication and symptoms. We now have almost 5,000 forum members, with new members joining every day.
We can’t do it without you...
We need your support to make the lives of those affected by epilepsy easier.
Please give generously to ensure that we can continue our vital work and pioneering research for everyone affected by epilepsy.
