Epilepsy/Seizures: What to do when someone has a seizure?

What to do when someone has a seizure? It is very important to recognize when the person has a seizure. You probably know some people with epilepsy. Watching someone having an epileptic attack is very frightening.Everybody should know more about seizures and symptoms. If a friend or family member ha...

What to do when someone has a seizure?

It is very important to recognize when the person has a seizure. You probably know some people with epilepsy. Watching someone having an epileptic attack is very frightening. Everybody should know more about seizures and symptoms. If a friend or family member has epilepsy, you should know what to do in that situation. If you recognize someone having a seizure you can help that person. Knowing what to do-and what not to do-when someone has a seizure is very important. Seizures usually last only a few minutes and generally do not require medical attention.

Seizures are paroxysmal episodes of sudden, involuntary muscle contractions and alterations in consciousness, behavior, sensation, and autonomic functioning. The episodes may be partial simple or complex or generalized absence, myoclonic, tonic, clonic, tonic-clonic and are labeled epilepsy if they are recurrent.

Symptoms of seizure

Help required during seizures depends on: the type of the seizure, how long the seizure lasts, how the seizure affects the person's consciousness and how severe it is.

A person watching an epileptic attack should carefully note the nature of the seizure in order to tell the doctor. Symptoms of seizure can be motor, psychic and sensory. Motor symptoms include recurrent involuntary muscle contractions of one body part (face, finger, hand, or arm) that may spread to other or same-side body parts. Sensory symptoms are auditory or visual hallucinations, paresthesias and vertigo.





Psychic symptoms include sensation of deja vu, complex hallucinations or illusions, unwarranted anger or fear, pupillary dilation and sweating.

Someone may have an aura before a seizure. An aura could include patting body parts, smacking lips, aimless walking, picking at clothes, unintelligible muttering and staggering gait. The person before seizure may have 1 to 2 minutes of loss of contact with surroundings, hallucinations.

How to recognize when someone is having a seizure?

Seizures may occur several times a day to one every few years. Emotional disturbances also may cause seizures. Some people have odd visual effects (auras) before a seizure, but others have no warning symptoms. Seizures can occur during sleep or after stimulation, as a blinking light or sudden loud sound. Most epileptic attacks are brief. They may affect the entire body or a small area. The muscles may contract and relax violently or only twitch slightly. Mental confusion can last for several minutes or for hours or days. Petit mal attacks are marked by loss of consciousness for several seconds and eye or muscle fluttering. Grand mal seizures are the classic muscle contractions involving the entire body, loss of consciousness, and often loss of bowel control. Seizures are often followed by drowsiness or confusion. Some seizures may require basic first aid.

The person with generalized absence could have transient loss of consciousness, flickering of eyelids or intermittent jerking of hands. The person with myoclonic seizures may have rapid, jerky movements in extremities or over entire body, which may cause a fall. Someone with tonic seizures could have sudden abnormal dystonic posture, deviation of eyes and head to one side. The persone with clonic seizures may have symmetric jerking of extremities for several minutes with loss of consciousness. The person with tonicclonic may have aura of epigastric discomfort, outcry, loss of consciousness, cyanosis, fall; tonic then clonic contractions, then limpness, sleep, headache, muscle soreness, confusion, and lethargy; loss of bowel and bladder control. The person also could have irregular breathing and blue tinge around the mouth.

What should you do when someone is having a seizure?

1. During seizure there are safety precautions to prevent injury, you should loosen restrictive clothing, roll the person on side to prevent aspiration, place a small pillow under the head and ease from a standing or sitting position to the floor.
   Don't move the person unless he or she is in immediate danger.



2. If the person is unconscious, make sure nothing is obstructing the nose or mouth. When you are watching an epileptic attack you should stay very calm and try not to panic.



3. You shouldn%26rsquo;t place a finger or other object into the person's mouth to protect or straighten the tongue--it is unnecessary and dangerous.



4. Don't perform artificial respiration during a seizure, even if the person is turning blue. Most seizures are over long before brain damage from lack of oxygen begins.



5. You shouldn%26rsquo;t try to hold the person still because you may injure the individual or yourself.



6. If the person has vomited, you should roll the person on side so that any fluid can easily flow out of mouth and not obstruct breathing.



7. If the person has a seizure may not hear you.



8. Don%26rsquo;t give the person anything to eat or drink until the person is fully recovered.



9. Don't give person medication by mouth until the seizure has stopped and he or she is completely awake and alert.



10. You should be calmly reassuring.



11. Stay with the person until recovery is complete.



12. You should maintain a patent airway, note frequency, type, time, involved body parts, and length of seizure.
    It is important to monitor vital signs and neurologic status.

A person with epilepsy should wear a Medic-Alert tag.

What should you do when a seizure stops?

After a minute or two the seizure and jerking movements should stop.
After the seizure you should gently turn the person's head to the side to let the saliva flow out of the mouth.
Let the person rest or sleep. After a seizure ends, most people sleep deeply.
Be reassuring, and calm as awareness returns.
When the person awakens, he or she may be disoriented for a while. You should repeat any information the person has missed during the seizure.


Complications may occur as a result of the onset of seizure activity and can include injury from a fall or from jerking, as well as airway occlusion and aspiration. You could help and prevent these complications if you learn how.
You should know that a condition known as status epilepticus, in which motor sensory or psychic seizures follow one another with no intervening periods of consciousness, is a medical emergency. Status epilepticus is usually convulsive. The seizures persist for 30 minutes or more. The airway occlusion and aspiration combined with muscular contractions during a seizure puts stress on the cardiovascular system. The lack of oxygen may lead to brain damage. If person doesn%26rsquo;t get immediate treatment may have hypoxia, hyperthermia, hypoglycemia and acidosis. That may cause a death. You could save someone%26rsquo;s life.

When to call a doctor?


Call doctor if you know it is the person's first seizure. If the seizure last more than fife minutes, or one seizure follows another without the person regaining consciousness between them you should call an ambulance. If the person is injured during the seizure you should call a doctor. If the person is pregnant or has diabetes or high blood pressure you should find medical help. If the person has a seizure in water, call a doctor.
When you help someone you will feel better. When you know how, you should always help someone with health problem.