PBS - SEIZED Inside the Mystery of Epilepsy (2016)

Epilepsy is one of the oldest and most mysterious ailments. Striking the organ most responsible for our very humanity — the brain — it can cause terrifying and disabling seizures that come without warning, at any time, in many different forms. SEIZED Inside the Mystery of Epilepsy tells powerful, intimate stories of patients, families and doctors fighting on the front lines for new treatments and new insights into this ancient disease.

Ouida, age 37, has complex partial seizures; she doesn’t lose consciousness or convulse, but she cannot respond and is unaware of her surroundings. She had her first seizure in 2006. One night her husband Brett woke up to a jerk in bed and saw Ouida completely stiff. Hoping for a cure, Ouida is taking a chance on a radical new surgery. A smart device will be implanted in her brain to detect a seizure and send electricity directly to try and stop it.

Ouida is one of three million Americans who have epilepsy. It affects more people than brain tumors, Parkinson’s disease, multiple sclerosis and cerebral palsy combined. For almost one third of all patients, epilepsy is uncontrollable, unremitting and all-consuming.

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