Posted by ed_uk2010 on November 18, 2011, at 12:32:04
In reply to Re: psychopharmacologist vs psychaitrist, posted by Solstice on November 17, 2011, at 22:31:12
>Really!? Wow. Here (the US), epilepsy is treated by neurologists, and more specifically by 'Epileptologists'(a sub-speciality of neurology.)
I don't think I explained it well at all. A specialist will be involved with the initial diagnosis but the specialist might not be a neurologist. For example, children may be referred to a hospital paediatrician. The specialist will decide on the treatment and titrate the dose but the medication will then be continued by the GP. They call this 'shared care', and it happens with most long term conditions here. Do your GPs only treat minor conditions?
A large proportion of epilepsy cases are not severe. Patients may have occasional seizures which are well controlled by a single medication. In these cases, there is not much for the specialist to do. Less often, epilepsy is extremely difficult to control and patients have multiple problems. A specialist will then be involved over a long period.
I didn't mean to give the impression that GPs diagnose and treat epilepsy without hospital intervention. It's just that mild/routine cases do not always need a great deal of specialist intervention beyond the initial diagnosis. That's not to say they won't have occasional follow ups at the hospital.
poster:ed_uk2010
thread:1002759
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20111110/msgs/1002998.html