Maddie in the EMU

Just after Christmas Maddie was admitted to the Epilepsy Monitoring Unit (EMU) in the hospital for two days. The goal was to see if she is still having seizures or if the "episodes" we're now seeing are tics, because the characteristics of the episodes have changed. In the EMU, we had to sleep deprive her and "stress her out" to try and bring on an episode. Maddie remained hooked up to the electrodes the entire time, and every move was recorded on camera 24/7. We were able to bring on three episodes and - praise God - they were tics! They saw no signs of seizures whatsoever. This is an answer to our prayers because our goal is to take her off the Keppra, which is a great medicine for controlling epilepsy but has negative behavioral side effects. It looks like we'll be able to take her off, pending word from her neurologist!

Maddie has come such a long way over the past few years. She is such a trooper!