The Seizures Disorders Center offers a comprehensive approach to the diagnosis and care of difficult-to-treat seizures and seizure-like episodes of unexplained attacks or loss of consciousness. The program, which is under the sponsorship of the department of medicine�s division of neurology, is the first of its kind on Staten Island and one of only a few such programs in New York.

Patients admitted to the program undergo a continuous electrocephologram, or EEG, which records the electrical activity of the brain. In this way, a correlation can be established between abnormal body movements and the site of the brain which is causing the seizure.

Patients may remain hospitalized from three to five days until sufficient information is recorded. During this stay, they  are under the care of their private physician and a physician member of St. Vincent�s neurology staff. Interpretation of the test results will be carried out by a group of epilepsy specialists from the Northeast Epilepsy Group.

Once seizures are appropriately diagnosed, medications, many relatively new, can be used to control their frequency to acceptable levels. For those with seizures that do not respond to medications, corrective neurosurgery may be advised. Neurosurgical procedures to treat recurrent seizures range from implantations within the brain to reduce seizure frequency to the removal of affected brain tissue identified as the site of seizure activity.

Staff
The program is under the direction of Marcelo Lancman, M.D., Associate Professor of Neurology at New York Medical College, who completed his epilepsy and neurophysiology training at the internationally recognized Cleveland Clinic Foundation.

Please call 718-818-2105 for more information.