Monday March 26 is International Purple Day, a day dedicated to increasing awareness about epilepsy worldwide.
It started in Nova Scotia in 2008, by eight year old Cassidy Megan. Megan has epilepsy and wanted to help raise awareness about the disorder.
Executive Director of the Edmonton Epilepsy Association, Gary Sampley says the biggest message he wants to get out is that anybody can develop epilepsy at anytime in their lives.
Get daily National news
“It’s not a disease. Head trauma can bring it on, you can be born with it, the onset of puberty can bring it on, high fever can bring it on, overuse of alcohol and drugs can bring it on.”
People with epilepsy have misfirings in the brain’s electrical currents that cause seizures.
Sampley says there are 44 known types of seizures and some are not as obvious as others.
“There are all types of other seizures that kids in school may have, where they just zone in and zone out frequently. You just think the kid is not paying attention. The child probably has absent seizure epilepsy.”
The colour purple was chosen as it is the colour of solitude, and often people with epilepsy can feel isolated.
One in every 100 people have epilepsy, including about 23,000 in the Edmonton area.
With files from Su-Ling Goh.
Comments
Want to discuss? Please read our Commenting Policy first.