Ketogenic Dietary Therapies For The Treatment Of Epilepsy

Ketogenic diet kd first proposed at the beginning of the last century is complex and has anticonvulsant effects yet not completely understood.

Ketogenic dietary therapies for the treatment of epilepsy. Although a larger number of antiepileptic drugs became available in the last decades epilepsy remains drug resistant in approximately a third of patients. Ketogenic diet therapy kdt is a group of high fat low carbohydrate diets used as an effective treatment option for children and adults with drug resistant epilepsy. Dietary treatments for epilepsy must only be followed with the support of an experienced epilepsy specialist and dietitian food specialist. Recently there has been interest in less restrictive kds including the modified atkins diet mad and the use of these diets has extended into adult.

The ketogenic diet used for over a century as an alternative therapy for the control of drug resistant seizures in both children and adults has recently drawn increasing interest in various neurological or psychiatric disorders other than epilepsy. The classic ketogenic diet is a special high fat low carbohydrate diet that helps to control seizures in some people with epilepsy. However adults may also benefit from dietary treatments. The end result was that the ketogenic diet therapies were beneficial for epilepsy and other neurological conditions such as dementia multiple sclerosis parkinson s disease and even brain tumors the findings suggest.

It has primarily been used in children with poorly controlled seizures but can be used for any age group. What is dietary therapy. Kossoff et al epilepsia open doi. The ketogenic diet kd being high in fat and low in carbohydrates has been suggested to reduce seizure frequency.

Dietary therapy is an approach to help control seizures usually in conjunction with seizure medications. In particular there are a few preliminary studies in mood and neurodevelopmental disorders such as anxiety depression and autism spectrum. Doctors usually recommend the ketogenic diet for children whose seizures have not responded to several different seizure medicines. Optimal clinical management of children receiving dietary therapies for epilepsy.

There is limited research on the efficacy of kdt in infants where there is the highest incidence of onset of the epilepsy. It works better with certain epilepsy syndromes and can help reduce seizures in two out of three children and may prevent seizures completely in one out. The ketogenic diet is an established treatment option for children with hard to control epilepsy. The ketogenic diet is a recognised and proven therapy for epilepsy since the 1920 s.