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"Doctor, what's going on with my son, he's usually fine, I heard from his classmates that he suddenly fell to the ground in the dormitory last night and had convulsions.
In the consultation room, Xiao Zhang's father eagerly inquired about his son's condition.
"It's been confirmed that it's a seizure, does anyone in your family have this disease, or did the child have problems with his development when he was a child?"
"No, my son has always been very healthy, and there is no problem with the examination when he was a child, how can a young man suddenly have a seizure?"
"There are many factors that cause epilepsy, and his classmate said that several of their roommates often stay up late to play games, and your son probably has epilepsy caused by this bad habit. ”
Contemporary people generally have the problem of staying up late, especially for young people, and playing games all night is as common as eating and drinking.
However, the combination of staying up late and playing games can actually have a special impact on the human body.
If there is no proper intervention for a long time, the nerves of the brain will undergo unexpected changes, and the external manifestation is seizures.
Why does the act of staying up late playing games cause epilepsy? Once it occurs, does it mean that it cannot be cured for life? How to avoid seizures in daily life? After reading it, you will understand!
1. The potential association between epilepsy and staying up late to play games
Clinically, epilepsy is often interpreted as an "abnormal electrical discharge" inside the human brain, which is a completely different concept from an external shock.
There are weak biocurrents inside the human body, which are active in the brain and provide strong support for nerve cells to transmit biological signals.
It can be said that the normal functioning of nerve function depends to a certain extent on the orderly activity of biocurrents.
Seizures, on the other hand, are when the bioelectric current is abnormally active, as if the bioelectric is getting lost and spinning around in the brain.
Tissues that were supposed to receive the electrical signal did not receive it, and tissues that should not have received the signal were repeatedly stimulated by bioelectric currents.
When the nerve operation of the brain is disrupted, the body will show corresponding abnormal states, and the most common external manifestations are falling to the ground, convulsions, rolling eyes, foaming at the mouth, etc.
Why do staying up late playing games become the trigger for seizures?
In the process of staying up late to play games, the human body will experience some complex changes, from behavioral habits to body movements, to neural activities, all of which are in a state of "tightrope walking".
Let's talk about staying up late first, aside from the long-term stay up late caused by special factors such as occupational characteristics, young people's stay up behavior is usually whim-spur and irregular, which will lead to circadian rhythm disorders.
Circadian rhythm refers to the changes in the body's operating patterns with the change of day and night.
If the body is forced to stay awake at night, the body does not get rest when it should rest, and the tissue functions that only play a role in the nighttime sleep state cannot be used normally, and the internal environment will become quite chaotic.
Once the circadian rhythm is unable to maintain a phased stability over a long period of time, the mode of operation of each major organ will change.
For example, the heart "bursts" after staying up late, dizziness after catching up on sleep, including insomnia, dreams, and fatigue, are all relatively common manifestations of rhythm disorders.
For the brain, the main abnormality caused by staying up late is that the cerebrospinal fluid flushing pattern is disrupted.
Cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) washes away the nerves in the brain during deep sleep, removing impurities around the nerves, including some toxic proteins.
When the environment around the nerves is purified, the nerves remain healthy and functional.
However, if you often stay up late, the quality of sleep is worrisome, the cerebrospinal fluid cannot effectively remove impurities in the brain, and the environment around the nerves deteriorates, and the possibility of neurological disorders will increase.
Then there is the behavior of playing games, young people play games, and their attention is usually more concentrated.
During the game, people try to increase their nerve sensitivity as much as possible, which is super high for the brain at night.
Especially in some difficult games, the brain nerves will be under more pressure.
However, in order to maintain the current behavior, the nerves in the brain have to force themselves to stay active, and the rest time is not repaired, and at the same time, they cannot be washed away by the cerebrospinal fluid, which further increases the risk of epilepsy.
Another factor is that staying up late to play games is actually very tiring, and a high degree of exhaustion is also an important factor in inducing epilepsy.
Long-term fatigue of the body and brain will repeatedly torment the fragile nerves, the brain environment is complex, and the possibility of biological signal transmission errors will increase.
When the brain is unable to withstand the continuous, high-intensity stimulation of staying up late to play games, abnormal nerve discharges become possible.
2. Is epilepsy difficult to treat?
Friends who know about epilepsy should know that the treatment of this disease can be high or low.
For some patients with a clear etiology and significant improvement after taking drugs, the condition can be improved by conventional treatment.
Some people go into spontaneous remission without treatment, such as infantile epilepsy.
However, considering that the affected area is in the brain, if there is a brain lesion, the cause is hidden, and the lesion cannot be accurately located by conventional medical means, the difficulty of treatment will be greatly increased, and the probability of recurrence in the later stage will be higher.
At present, the conventional clinical treatment methods include drug therapy, surgical treatment, etc.
Regardless of the need for surgery (tumor resection, etc.), depending on the characteristics of the patient, multiple drugs can be taken alone or in combination to reduce seizures.
For example, generalized tonic seizures (usually caused by angular arch reflexion) can be treated with valproic acid or gabapentin.
Spastic seizures (usually physical convulsions) can be treated with carbamazepine or levetiracetam.
Absence seizures (usually loss of consciousness) can be treated with clonazepam or topiramate.
In general, people with mild epilepsy can be controlled by taking a single drug as needed.
However, in patients with more severe or complex etiology, a combination of drugs may be involved.
Taking into account factors such as the side effects of the drug and the actual situation of the patient, the doctor will prescribe the drug according to the patient's age, disease type, gender difference and other characteristics.
Like most underlying conditions, epilepsy medications should be started at a small dose and then transitioned to a normal dose once the body has fully adapted to the drug response.
It should be reminded that the epilepsy medication should not be adjusted privately, even if there is no sign of recurrence after long-term medication, do not blindly stop the medication.
Patients should go to the hospital in time to check whether the nerve status in the brain is stable before judging whether the drug can be stopped.
Fortunately, about 50% of people with epilepsy can be relapsed for the rest of their lives after receiving conventional treatment.
Therefore, half of the patients do not need to rely on medication for long-term control, as long as they do a good job of daily maintenance, they can avoid the risk of seizures.
3. In addition to taking medication, how can I reduce the risk of seizures in my life?
In terms of type, there are two major categories of etiology: obvious and insidious etiology.
If the cause is obvious, it is usually caused by head trauma, growth retardation in infancy and early childhood, brain diseases, bacterial brain infection, genetics, metabolic diseases, etc.
In contrast, the etiology is insidious, usually with overt seizure features, but the lesion cannot be identified.
Of course, for the general population who have not yet developed the disease, considering that epilepsy may cause damage to brain function, daily maintenance should also be emphasized.
Regardless of whether the etiology is clear or the type of epilepsy has an insidious etiology, patients should follow their doctor's instructions to take their medications scientifically.
Doing so not only reduces the abnormal stimulation of the brain caused by epilepsy, but also improves the environment in the brain, thereby reducing the number of seizures that occur again.
On a day-to-day basis, it is necessary to reduce the risk factors that induce epilepsy as much as possible.
For example, long-term excessive fatigue, irregular work and rest, contact with the source of infection, etc., may become the trigger for another seizure.
In terms of physical exertion, it should be ensured that the physical load is not exceeded, like some workers who have been engaged in heavy physical labor for a long time, the probability of developing epilepsy will be slightly increased.
Sudden periodical overfatigue will also increase the probability of seizures.
In terms of work and rest, contemporary people are addicted to staying up late, not only young people, but also many children and middle-aged and elderly people are also "crazy to stay up late".
In order to prevent epilepsy caused by changes in the brain environment caused by circadian rhythm disturbances, patients are advised to actively adjust their lifestyle and at least ensure a stable sleep schedule.
Exposure to infectious agents is primarily related to environmental or work-based exposures. In some special cases, people have to come into close contact with a variety of harmful substances.
The risk of seizures increases if you do not take proper precautions in your life and work, inhaling harmful substances and causing brain infections.
Effective precautions are recommended for exposure to infectious sources.
For example, wearing a mask when going out and wearing protective work clothes at work can avoid the impact of pollution sources to a certain extent and reduce the possibility of brain infection.
In addition to avoiding risk factors, it is also important to keep a good record of the onset of the disease.
Considering that some patients will have recurrent seizures over different time spans, in order to ensure the effectiveness of the treatment, patients can record their onset according to their own situation.
When it occurs, how long it lasts, how the body feels and reacts, and how often it occurs.
These data can assist doctors in judging the specific situation and changes in the patient's condition, and play a key role in the subsequent adjustment of treatment plan.
epilogue
Epilepsy can occur at any age, so don't assume that young people who are strong and mentally will not get sick.
Staying up late for a long time to play games is too taxing on the brain, and the nerve stimulation increases, which may eventually develop into epilepsy.
There are many ways to choose from the treatment of this disease, and the treatment methods are also mature, and the lifetime non-recurrence rate after scientific treatment reaches half, which is good news for the subsequent life of patients.
In order to avoid recurrence of seizures, for diagnosed patients, it is necessary to follow the doctor's instructions to take medication scientifically, avoid daily risk factors, and make a good record of the onset of seizures, so as to effectively reduce the recurrence rate.
Dear friends, how much do you know about epilepsy, and do you usually have the habit of staying up late to play games?