Farah Ashrafzadeh; Hadi Tohidi; Elnaz Faraji; Alireza Ataei Nakhaei
Abstract
Epilepsy is a major neurological disorder, which may occur in all age groups, including children. Approximately 20% of epileptic children are drug-resistant. Uncontrolled seizures pose variable risks to patients, such as increased mortality rate, trauma, and cognitive and psychiatric disorders. Therefore, ...
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Epilepsy is a major neurological disorder, which may occur in all age groups, including children. Approximately 20% of epileptic children are drug-resistant. Uncontrolled seizures pose variable risks to patients, such as increased mortality rate, trauma, and cognitive and psychiatric disorders. Therefore, effective treatment is essential to controlling seizure attacks. Although many antiepileptic drugs are currently available for clinical treatments, clinicians are concerned with the discovery of safer drugs with enhanced antiepileptic effects and fewer side-effects. Traditional medicine provides strong grounds for modern medicine. Use of some medicinal plants has been shown to reduce or prevent the further progression of epileptic seizures. The present review aimed to discuss the effectiveness of some medicinal plants in the treatment of children with intractable epilepsy. An online literature review was conducted in databases such as IranMedex, Scopus, Medline, and Google Scholar to identify the studies investigating the use of medicinal plants in children with intractable epilepsy. In addition, the files of the authors were reviewed in the reference lists and bibliographies of the retrieved articles. According to the results, herbal therapies could potentially yield new treatment options for children with intractable epilepsy. Using medicinal herbs could be a cost-efficient treatment method in these patients as a culturally acceptable option to their families.
Mina Erfani; Farah Ashrafzadeh; javad Akhondian; Hamid Reza Rahimi; Mehran Beiraghi-Toosi; Hashem Lashgari-Kalat; Ehsan Alaei; Monica Zeynalzadeh
Abstract
Nearly 70 million people worldwide suffer from epilepsy. Despite administration of routine antiepileptic drugs (AEDs), nearly 30% of seizures are resistant to treatment called drug resistant epilepsy (DRE). Since the epilepsy treatment may result in consequences of multi-drugs administration or sometimes ...
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Nearly 70 million people worldwide suffer from epilepsy. Despite administration of routine antiepileptic drugs (AEDs), nearly 30% of seizures are resistant to treatment called drug resistant epilepsy (DRE). Since the epilepsy treatment may result in consequences of multi-drugs administration or sometimes invasive surgical methods in DRE, herbal treatment can be a good alternative choice due to its easy accessibility, lower cost and fewer side effects. Although turmeric has been one of a very commonly used dietary spices and traditional herbal remedies, its derivation as a newly introduced medicine-curcumin has not been used to a large extent. In this literature, we have reviewed the available trial researches, which studied specifically antiepileptic effect of curcumin. We searched databases of Science direct, PubMed and Google Scholar (2008 to 2016) with key words of turmeric, curcumin, Diferuloylmethane, Epilepsy, and Seizure to find the related references. The major extract of turmeric curcumin has found to have antiepileptic effect according to recent surveys. It not only has no critical adverse effect, but also can protect patients from other AEDs severe side effects. It also makes it possible to gradually decrease the dose of AEDs in long-term combination therapy.