My 21 yr old son has epilepsy ocd tourettes and social anxiety and has frequent !


Question:

My 21 yr old son has epilepsy ocd tourettes and social anxiety and has frequent seizures .?

He is in college 6 hrs away from home and has had 2 seizures in the last week because he forgets and or refuses to take his antiseizure Rx on schedule. He is in the er right now. His new dorm roommate callled the paramedics. For the last 4 yrs he has been very irresponsible about taking his Rx. He has had several er visits after having seizures resulting in splitting his forehead requiring 5 stitches and dislocating his shoulder several times. He is under the care of a neurologist and psychotherapist. HOW DO I GET THIS KID TO TAKE HIS RX ON TIME? I am at wit's end.


Answers:

What kind of system does he have to remind him to take his medicines? Does he have a pill container so his pills are laid out for him a week in advance? That's helpful as it gets so routine for anyone who gets used to taking meds everyday, it's easy to forget whether one took one's meds or not at any one particular time. Anyone needs a system to look back and see, yes there they are, or it can be tempting to assume he or she took them. Then he needs to know from his neurologist what to do if he misses a dose. Many anticonvulsants have such a long half-life that he should make up any doses he misses, up to some limit his neurologist determines. Otherwise the effect of that missed dose will keep his blood levels low for days.

How about electronic devices that beep at him when it's time for a dose? A timer on a watch would work or something else more programmed.

Has the neurologist done everything to simplify his meds? Does the neurologist think that missed doses are the problem? Sometimes people assume that poor control is missed doses when it's something else. I had patients when I was still practicing neurology who had low Dilantin levels in the ER after a seizure time and time again, and each time someone assumed the patient was noncompliant, but in fact the patient had a metabolism that required an unusually high dose to maintain a good level.

If your son resists taking medicine that's very different. He and his therapist need to get at the cause of that, whether he's apathetic or what.




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