Abstracts

RATIONALE:_We could prove that with the help of a computer-based graph showing the course of epilepsy, the treatment of patients with difficult-to-treat epilepsy can be improved. The wide range of application of these graphs with out-patient epilepsy patients used to fail as doctors were not regularly updating patient data. Thus it seemed sensible to develop a computer calendar for recording medical data, in which the patient or his relatives take over a substantial part of the data input. METHODS: Included in the treatment calendar is patient data, the seizure diagnosis, the number of seizures per day, the daily dosage and blood levels of the epilepsy medication. The patient receives the software during the first consultation and is shown by the doctor how to use the program. The Patient installs the software into his computer at home an regularly inputs data. This medical data is then on a disk, which the patient brings to every consultation. The data from this disk is then read by the doctor s computer which puts the data into a graph. RESULTS:_Through this, the patient and the doctor are immediately in a position to discuss the previous course of epilepsy and can discuss further action for the optimization of treatment. Patients with chronic epilepsy have the collected data with them throughout their lives and can provide every doctor, who has the software, with this record. The doctor is in a position to monitor the data from several patients at one time. Finally, scientific institutions are in a position to analyze the data of several anonymous patients. CONCLUSIONS: The pilot study in numerous special out-patient epilepsy centers has shown that both patients and doctors considered the computerized treatment calendar an effective way to optimize treatment. In addition to that, the treatment calendar is very good for the setting-up of prospective epilepsy databases.