Epilepsy Awareness

 Epilepsy Manager

 Continuing Medical Education

 BRIDGES

 EPILEPSY HOTLINE

(Bridging Referrals to Improve Delivery of Grassroots Epilepsy Services)
-a project of the Health Care Delivery Committee of the Philippine League Against Epilepsy in order to bring epilepsy care to the grassroots.

THE VISION:

We see persons with epilepsy . . .
Who have ready access to an efficient referral system from the
grassroots level to the experts in the field of epilepsy in collaborations
with the Department of Health and other organizations;

1. OBJECTIVE - to establish an efficient referral system for epilepsy care services at the primary, secondary and tertiary levels within the context of the existing national health care system.
   Through this referral system we will

   • Assist the gov't in providing epilepsy healthcare services

   • Identify needs, and encourage the government to establish secondary care epilepsy clinics in the different regions of the country and support the development of tertiary referral units/centers.

   
   
   

2. BACKGROUND AND RATIONALE
   Epilepsy Care consists of:
   

   1. Professional Care-which is available in the country at three levels:
      

      1. primary care-these are the primary care physicians consisting of general practitioners, family physicians, internists, rural health physicians which the patient initially consult.

      2. secondary care-168 practicing neurologists distributed in the different regions of the country(although majority are concentrated in the NCR;13 regions in the country have practicing certified neurologists)

      3. tertiary care-neurologists with special training in the field of epilepsy.

   2. Epilepsy Services

      1. primary care clinics-private clinics of primary care physicians, rural health clinics

      2. general neurology clinics-private clinics of neurologists

      3. epilepsy clinics-epilepsy clinics at the different accredited Neurology training centers (government/private; pay and charity)

      4. specialized centers-with facilities for long term EEG monitoring and or epilepsy surgery.

   At present, most of the available professional care and services for persons with epilepsy in the country are shouldered by the patients and their families out-of-pocket since epilepsy is not part of the government national health care program. There is also no existing referral system for epilepsy care within the national health care system.
   
   

3. PROJECT DESCRIPTION.
   The BRIDGES project is a network-referral system wherein problematic cases among epilepsy patients seen by rural health physicians(primary care) in the different areas of the country can have access to neurologists(secondary care) and experts in the field of epilepsy(tertiary care)
   Participants
   

   1. Rural Health Physicians-referring physicians from the rural health clinics.
      

   2. Epilepsy Referral Consultants-volunteer neurologists from the different regions of the country.
      

   3. Tertiary epilepsy units/centers-epilepsy clinics/centers with expertise and capability to provide tertiary level epilepsy care.

      The EPILEPSY REFERRAL CONSULTANT
      

      Will evaluate charity patient referrals from rural health physicians and decide whether to:
      

      1. Send the patient back to the rural health physician for follow-up and long term care with a Diagnosis and treatment recommendations.

      2. Recommend subsequent follow-up visits/periodic re-evaluation if deemed necessary.

      3. Recommend referral to tertiary epilepsy units.

      4. Initially follow-up patients evaluated by the tertiary epilepsy units and decide whether subsequent ff-up's will be at the secondary or primary level.

   4. Tertiary Epilepsy Units/Centers

      1. will evaluate patients referred by the Epilepsy Referral Consultants.

      2. send the patient back to the Epilepsy Referral Consultant after a complete evaluation and or definitive management

   GUIDELINES FOR REFERRAL TO TERTIARY EPILEPSY UNITS
   
   

   • Patients with difficult to control seizures

   • Patients with difficult to classify seizure types and epilepsy syndromes

   • Possible pseudoseizures

   • Further diagnostic procedures and evaluation

   • Candidates for epilepsy surgery

   • Others : Maternal seizures, Treatment complications

   
   
   

4. TIME TABLE
   

   • Recruitment of Epilepsy Referral Consultant Volunteers
     January-March 2002
     

   • Organizational Meeting
     March 15,2002 (Fontana Leisure Resort, Angeles City)
     

   • Meeting with Heads of Tertiary Epilepsy Units/Centers
     May 13,2002(Fridays, Quezon City)

   • Consultative Meeting-Workshop on Epilepsy Care
     June 7,2002(Canyon Woods Resort,Laurel Batangas)
     

   • BRIDGES Network Implementation Meet
     1st Quarter 2003