I’d like to use this month’s blog post to highlight a superb article that was published this year on psychogenic non-epileptic seizures in Clinical Psychology Review (issue 47). In my opinion, this publication is what all professionals who work with PNES should be aspiring to contribute to the field. In past blog posts I have […]
For many it may have taken months to years to reach the point of lying in the hospital bed hearing the words: you don’t have “epilepsy,” you have something we call “psychogenic non-epileptic seizures” or “non-epileptic attack disorder.” Getting here may have involved being seen by more than one doctor, receiving all sorts of other
Many health professionals still hold misconceptions regarding PNES itself. Many still believe that the psychogenic episodes are somehow voluntary in nature. Others are uncertain about prognosis and when it comes to treatment many tend to offer a knee-jerk suggestion of CBT (cognitive behavior therapy) without taking into account that a substantial number of mental health
Six months ago, Prof. Markus Reuber and one of his doctoral graduate students launched a research study in which patients diagnosed with PNES and epilepsy were invited to participate in a writing experience that tested whether this helped them feel more in control of their condition and reduce their seizures and improve their quality of
New International Research Project for persons living with PNES (NEAD) Read More »
This year’s conference promises to be superb. We are honored to have as our invited speaker, pediatric neuropsychiatrist, Dr. Rochelle Caplan of UCLA (http://people.healthsciences.ucla.edu/institution/personnel?personnel_id=8660) and we will have several other wonderful speakers talking about both PNES diagnosis and treatment in adults and children. We are also working to set up talks by a few new
When I was a kid, I was not especially athletic. Rather, I was more on the bookish side of things. In fact, I am a bit ashamed of admitting but on more than one occasion, I convinced my mother to obtain a medical note for me so that I would be allowed to not participate
Warning: the content in this blog post may be upsetting and hurtful to the reader-it contains insulting and coarse language found on-line describing patients with PNES For a few months three of us have been working on a project examining how often PNES (and all the other names that this condition goes by) appears
Pseudoseizures, the bias held by some health professionals and this really has to stop! Read More »
The time and place: Vienna, Austria in the 1800’s. The main character of the story is real: Bertha Pappenheim (AKA Anna O). In Guises of Desire, the author, Hilda Reilly, recounts Bertha’s intense years living with these psychogenic symptoms using a wonderful combination of solid research and imagination. Ms. Reilly descriptions of Bertha’s variety of
Although there are estimates that suggest that PNES is more prevalent than multiple sclerosis (MS), it is far likelier that someone will have heard of MS than of PNES. Psychogenic non-epileptic seizures are still a long way from where this disorder needs to be in terms of what health professionals know about it and what
Psychogenic non-epileptic seizures will be highlighted for the third year in a row when the Northeast Regional Epilepsy Group (NEREG) holds its annual PNES conference in New Jersey on October 29, 2016. As always, the conference is free of charge and open to anyone who is interested in learning more about psychogenic seizures; this includes
What you need to know if psychogenic non-epileptic seizures (PNES) are part of your life Read More »
