MYOCLONIC EPILEPSY

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MYOCLONIC EPILEPSY

• BY TRYSHA SRONCE

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WHAT IS MYOCLONIC EPILEPSY?

• Epilepsy is a disorder of the central nervous
  system.
• When a person has epilepsy, the brains
  electrical rhythms become imbalanced and cause
  recurrent seizures.
• Myoclonic epilepsy is usually quick little jerks
  of the arms, shoulders, and occasionally the
  legs.
• Myoclonus is the brief, involuntary twitching of
  a muscle or group of muscles.

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WHAT CAUSES MYOCLONIC EPILEPSY?

• Exactly what causes epilepsy is unknown for about
  half the people it effects.
• Myoclonic twitches are usually caused by sudden
  muscles contractions.
• Myoclonus may develop in response to infection,
  head or spinal cord injury, stroke, brain tumors,
  and many other diseases.
• Myoclonus can occur by itself, but most often it
  is one of several symptoms associated with a wide
  variety of nervous system disorders.

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SYMPTOMS

• Myoclonic seizures are often described as
  jumps. These jumps are caused by the rapid
  contraction and relaxation of the muscles.
• Seizures affect different people in different
  ways and they can take many forms. Many seizures
  have a beginning, middle, and end.
• BEGINNING not everyone is aware of a beginning.
  Some seizures will come without warning. A person
  may sense an aura about them just before a
  seizure.

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SYMPTOMS

• MIDDLE people that experience warnings might see
  the aura just continue or it can turn into a
  complex partial seizure or convulsion. People
  without warnings might just jump into the partial
  seizure.
• END the post-ictal period is the recovery
  period of the brain back to its normal state. The
  length of a recovery time can depend on what area
  of the brain was affected and whether or not the
  person was on any anti-seizure medications. The
  post-ictal period can last anywhere from seconds
  to hours.

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SYMPTOMS OR WARNINGS

• EARLY WARNING SIGNS
• Déjà vu, smells, sounds, tastes, vision lost,
  racing thoughts, fear, panic, pleasant feelings,
  dizziness, lightheaded, nausea, and numbness.
• SEIZURE SYMPTOMS
• Blackout, confusion, deafness, loss of
  consciousness, convulsions, stiffening,
  difficulty breathing, incontinence, inability to
  move.
• AFTER SEIZURE SYMPTOMS
• Memory loss, confusion, frustration, headache,
  nausea, pain, exhaustion, fear, thirst, and
  difficulty speaking.

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TREATMENT AND PROGNOSIS

• The exact origins of myoclonus are unclear so it
  may require multiple drugs that work on different
  brain pathways for effective treatment.
• The downside to these drugs is that many of the
  side effects become harmful if taken for long
  periods of time.
• Patients often develop tolerance for the drugs so
  they need to be monitored closely.
• PROGNOSIS
• Myoclonus is not a life threatening disorder but
  it can result in very serious, debilitating
  impairments.

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2 MAIN TYPES OF MYOCLONIC EPILEPSY

• JUVENILE MYOCLONIC EPILEPSY (JME)
• People afflicted with JME have myoclonic
  seizures, usually in the morning soon after they
  wake up.
• Sometimes these little jerks are followed by
  tonic-clonic or absence seizures.
• JME patients have seizures that are triggered by
  flickering lights on T.V., games, or at dances as
  well as light reflecting off water.
• More than 80 of the JME population find that
  their seizures are controlled very well by
  medication.

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2 MAIN TYPES OF MYOCLONIC EPILEPSY

• PROGRESSIVE MYOCLONIC EPILEPSY (PME)
• PME is a combination of myoclonic and
  tonic-clonic seizures.
• Some additional symptoms are muscles rigidity,
  unsteadiness, and mental deterioration.
• PME is a group of rare disorders that strike at
  any age depending on the type of myoclonic
  epilepsy a person has. Some PME syndromes
  include
• Severe myoclonic epilepsy of infancy (Dravet
  Syndrome)
• Unverrich-Lundberg Disease
• Lafora Disease
• Mitochondrial Encephalopathies

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TREATMENTS OF PME

• Treatments of PME are usually only successful for
  a few months or years. As the disorder
  progresses, the anti-seizure medications become
  less effective.
• This makes the outlook generally unfavorable.
• Patients often lose their abilities to think and
  move, but results vary on a case by case basis.

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QUESTIONS???

• 1.) Myclonus may develop in response to ______.
• A. Infection B. Brain tumors
• C. Stroke D. All of the above
• 2.) Epilepsy is a disorder of the ______.
• A. Central Nervous System
• B. Peripheral Nervous System
• 3.) Patients often develop ______ the drugs they
  take during treatment.
• A. an addiction to B. a tolerance for
• C. tumors from D. random seizures from
• 4.) People with Juvenile Myoclonic Epilepsy
  usually have seizures in the ____.
• A. morning B. afternoon
• C. night D. 500 p.m.