Diabetes drug could hold epilepsy treatment potential

A diabetes drug widely used to help diabetics manage their condition could also become recognised as an effective and secure way of treating epilepsy . According to reports, the drug could be particularly useful in treating those epileptic patients that suffer from recurrent seizures, despite therapy with standard drugs.
Metformin (Metformine) acts to aid epileptics in a similar way to a ketogenic diet . This severe dietary approach to treating epilepsy minimises levels of dietary starch and sugar.
A team headed up by Dr. Avtar Roopra found that a metformin was able to turn on a molecule that regulates energy, and then found that they could suppress over-active nerve cells by inhibiting the transfer of sugar into excess energy.
The research is currently at an early stage, but the doctors intend to apply their results to a mouse model in the near future.