The Epilepsy Foundation of Minnesota Blog

“I was so excited to be at Camp Oz because it was the first time I had ever stayed away from my parents. I wanted to go to Camp Oz because I wanted to make new friends and I love to be independent,” says Shreya.

The Epilepsy Foundation of Minnesota’s (EFMN) promise is that nobody journeys through epilepsy alone. Marcia Kautz’s journey shows just how important this statement is. Marcia and her husband Dean have been journeying together since her first seizure in 1988, and the partnerships they’ve built along the way have been life-changing.

The Necastro family’s epilepsy journey began in 2019 when Noah was eight years old. They immediately learned of our programs and events from their neurologist, and it quickly became a journey filled with support and education. The support came from joining family programs like the annual Walk, Parent Connect Groups,

What have we learned about COVID and epilepsy and its effects on seizures among adults and children? An update with two years of information.

Seina Showen, a school nurse in Hermantown, uses advocacy to promote classroom trainings and increase epilepsy awareness and education.

The Atwell’s lost their daughter Stephanie to Sudden Unexpected Death in Epilepsy (SUDEP), but are now helping others live a full life with epilepsy.

As the parents of a young son with epilepsy, we are humbled by the individuals and organizations who have become a part of our lives and have had a hand in helping raise our child. Our son, Jack, now ten years old, was diagnosed with Lennox-Gastaut Syndrome, a severe form of epilepsy, at the age of four.

The Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) Committee helps us better serve communities of color, Native communities, individuals living with complex and rare epilepsies, and communities marginalized through social, economic, and political barriers as well as health care providers working most directly with these populations. Dr. Nitin Agarwal is the Medical

Our journey with epilepsy began about 35 years ago when Marcia had a grand mal seizure.  

That journey has been difficult many times, when promising medications suddenly lose their effectiveness and break-through seizures occur.  The journey begins anew whenever a change in medication is warranted.  

When I graduated as a Registered Nurse 15 years ago, the online resources like nursing apps for your phone, epilepsy websites, and Facebook groups weren’t quite as easy to come by as they are now.

Seizures were scary to me. There were medications that needed to be given daily, certain diets to help with seizures and then there were the medications to give if my client was having a seizure! And that may have been their only diagnosis or only just one of them.