I'm crying my eyes out at little Charlie, who's now free from seizures due to his ketogenic diet. What a wonderful outcome for the little fella and his parents! 
My older sister who's now in her 60s was diagnosed with grand mall epilepsy when she was 16 but petit mal was suspected prior to that and interestingly, my mother told me that when she was born she took ages to finish a feed and would fall asleep and have to be tickled to wake her up. It was also recommended that she be put on a full cream feed so I'm pretty sure the medics even all those years ago had an idea about diet and neurology although nothing was ever explained to my mother. My sister was also known to be a 'naughty' child and often punished for it. Today we'd probably call her 'hyperactive'.
I discovered the ketogenic diet about 15 years ago and read up on it and found a video about a true life family with a young child with epilepsy, called 'First Do No Harm' which I think Meryl Streep starred in and I gave it to my sister to watch. She'd been on meds for so long though that she didn't trust that the diet would work for her so I don't think she ever tried it. But for young children I'd say it has to be worth a try.
Before any diet is dismissed as a 'fad' we really need to stop and think about what it might just be correcting in the body of someone with a medical condition.
My older sister who's now in her 60s was diagnosed with grand mall epilepsy when she was 16 but petit mal was suspected prior to that and interestingly, my mother told me that when she was born she took ages to finish a feed and would fall asleep and have to be tickled to wake her up. It was also recommended that she be put on a full cream feed so I'm pretty sure the medics even all those years ago had an idea about diet and neurology although nothing was ever explained to my mother. My sister was also known to be a 'naughty' child and often punished for it. Today we'd probably call her 'hyperactive'.
I discovered the ketogenic diet about 15 years ago and read up on it and found a video about a true life family with a young child with epilepsy, called 'First Do No Harm' which I think Meryl Streep starred in and I gave it to my sister to watch. She'd been on meds for so long though that she didn't trust that the diet would work for her so I don't think she ever tried it. But for young children I'd say it has to be worth a try.
Before any diet is dismissed as a 'fad' we really need to stop and think about what it might just be correcting in the body of someone with a medical condition.
I thought it was interesting to see a description of a diet (albeit a simple description) that others have described as 'dangerous', 'starvation' or 'unsustainable' being recommended for a 4 year old child. Can it be that this diet can be healthy for epileptics but unhealthy for diabetics? What about high levels of saturated fat and not enough carbs for muscle development or brain function? Surely Charlie would end up with terrible levels of cholesterol?
They said that there's a poor uptake of this treatment for Epilepsy due to a lack of funding. Just how much funding does it take to promote trying this diet, to the parents of an Epileptic? Or is this just another case of entrenched practice in a health service that moves far too slowly and is resistant to change.
They said that there's a poor uptake of this treatment for Epilepsy due to a lack of funding. Just how much funding does it take to promote trying this diet, to the parents of an Epileptic? Or is this just another case of entrenched practice in a health service that moves far too slowly and is resistant to change.
swimmer2 said:
I've actually wondered for a long time whether epilepsy and diabetes are somehow linked. I don't mean that all diabetics are prone to epilepsy or vice versa but that there is some common link between the two conditions that is food and nutrition related and it affects one person one way, and the other in a different way. My sister who is epileptic, for example, has always disliked fatty foods and preferred sweet foods and carbs. She'd happily live on cakes and biscuits. So perhaps she's lacking in whatever fat does for our body, the omegas etc and brain function.
I just think so many people who've spent years with epilepsy could perhaps be helped by something as simple as tweaking their diet, has to be worth a try. And the same can be said of diabetes.
And yes, I think the health service is set in its ways and does move too slowly because it's far too big and unwieldy and it takes far too long for decisions to be made because to even change a lightbulb in the NHS you're talking about setting up a committee, a sub comittee, a working party, a steering group and a thousand meetings about meetings before anyone actually gets the job of 'Lightbulb changer'. The machine has grown to big for its boots and now all it's resources are being spent on just keeping the machine going, but it's not actually going anywhere.
It was around in the 20's and 30's, but as medicines were created they left the diet alone. There is a book by Lyle Mcdonald - really expensive on amazon, its an in depth way of how to do it.
Google body recomposition for Lyles info
Google body recomposition for Lyles info
swimmer2 said:
I thought exactly that Swimmer and I think you are probably right re the last 2 comments. What a shame for the people who could benefit from this with a little knowledge and some commitment on their part ,which will surely be worthwhile.
Mary
modesty007
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Ketogenic diet is likely to work fine for glucose greedy cancer forms as well (they can actually test this with a PET), it works for many with T2 diabetes. But since there's little interest both from pharma industry and since governments that are still using outdated not evidence based diet recommendations, including the BIG fear of fat, it might take time before this more natural approach is more documented and recommended.
