Today is World Epilepsy Day (popularly called the Purple Day) and keeping this in mind Bangalore-headquartered British Biologicals, one of India’s leading nutraceutical company, has introduced a cost-effective therapy that holds abundant hope for epileptic patients. The company is the manufacturer of ketogenic diet, which is effective in reducing seizure frequency in children. In India, the incidence of epilepsy is about 2.5-5.6 per a population of 1,000; and the chronic cases are six to seven in a lakh.
Six-year-old Aditya Nadkarni of Mumbai was diagnosed with paediatric epilepsy within months of his birth. The boy’s parents made enquiries with the best medical minds before admitting the child to Mumbai’s Hinduja Hospital. There were only two paths available to them to give the toddler a new lease of life: one, a surgical removal of the affected part of the brain; two, treating through ketogenic diet.
The boy was operated upon, but the disease raised its ugly head within months, affecting the child. His worried parents rushed back to the hospital for a course of ketogenic diet — a hassle-free treatment available since the Vedic times, but rediscovered in the early part of the 20th century. By age three, the boy was like any other of his age — full of energy and free of all drugs albeit with some speech difficulties.
The Hinduja Hospital team headed by Dr Vrajesh Udani, who treated Aditya, says the ketogenic diet is effective in reducing seizure frequency in children. The programme started in 1997 has seen the diet being administered to more than 130 children with good results. Some 60 per cent of the patients treated with the ketogenic diet were able to achieve 50 per cent or more reduction in seizure frequency. Of these, half had their fits reduced by more than 90 per cent.
Aditya is not alone in this league of success stories. Thousands of people suffering from seemingly chronic form of epilepsy have pulled themselves back from the brink and are able to see bright sunshine in their lives, thanks to ketogenic diet.
VS Reddy, Founder and Managing Director, British Biologicals, says, “Ketokid helps epileptic patients lead a normal lifestyle. In fact, to this end, we offer free services of nutritionists and dieticians to all doctors and hospitals treating children through ketogenic diet.”
Dr Purnima Prabhu of Hinduja Hospital says, “The key factor for success is a motivated family that ensures dietary compliance for two to three years, the usual duration for the diet therapy. Managing the diet is easier abroad, as special, fairly palatable keto-foods are available in food stores. These were difficult to procure in India earlier.”
The cost benefits are best understood given that one per cent of the world’s population is affected by epilepsy, and 15 to 30 per cent of the patients do not respond to sustained and continuous treatment. A person is said to be suffering from intractable epilepsy when a patient has seizures at least twice a month for more than two years despite being administered two first-line primary drugs.
Leading paediatric neurosurgeon Dr Vykunta Raju KN, an assistant professor at Bangalore’s Indira Gandhi Institute of Child Health, says, “Ketogenic diet, which is recently brought out by British Biologicals as Ketokid, is useful in treating patients with refractory epilepsy. This diet helps in controlling seizures and allows many children to become both seizure-free and drug-free.”
This view is endorsed by another leading paediatric neurosurgeon Dr Mahesh Kamate. He says: “Ketogenic diet is a safe and effective option in managing and treating epilepsy among infants and children. Even in ICU care, the ketogenic diet can be used to control refractory seizures. The diet is highly cost effective when compared with other anti-epileptic drugs.”
Ketokid works in the following ways: Ketogenic diet mimics starvation by producing ketosis; Then, ketosis is maintained through high fat, adequate protein and low carbohydrate diet; The degree of ketosis could be modified by adjusting the amount of fat; For instance, a 5:1 (fat:non-fat) diet will result in greater ketosis than a 2:1 diet.
Ketogenic diet for treatment of epilepsy is known since the Vedicages, but fell out of favour with the advent of anti-epileptic drugs. It was revived by Dr H Keith from the Mayo Clinic and Dr Freeman from the John Hopkins Hospital. Since then, several centres all over the world have started using it and the British Biologicals is the first and the only Indian company to manufacture Ketokid based on ketogenic formula for the Indian market.
EP News Bureau – Mumbai