Nico Enslin Johannes M, Muh Carrie R, Wang Xiongfei, von Hertwig Fernandes de Olivera Tatiana, McKhann Guy M, Damisah Eyiyemisi, Al-Otaibi Faisal, Rydenhag Bertil, Ali Rushna P, Dorfer Christian, Englot Dario J, Cukiert Arthur
Division of Neurosurgery, Department of Surgery, University of Cape Town and Red Cross War Memorial Children's Hospital, Cape Town, South Africa.
Department of Neurosurgery and Department of Pediatrics, Maria Fareri Children's Hospital, Westchester Medical Center, Valhalla, New York, USA.
Epilepsia. 2025 Feb;66(2):319-327. doi: 10.1111/epi.18199. Epub 2024 Dec 5.
Up to 80% of the world's population with epilepsy lives in low and middle-income countries. Around one-third of these patients will have drug-resistant epilepsy, for which epilepsy surgery is an option. Unfortunately, many of these regions, as well as some more developed nations, lack sufficient epilepsy surgery units and trained neurosurgeons. With this in mind, the International League Against Epilepsy (ILAE) formed the Epilepsy Surgery Education Taskforce to address the shortage of further educational opportunities for surgeons and neurologists and to promote the creation of more epilepsy surgery units around the world. In this article, we publish our findings from a web-based international survey, in which we investigated the global distribution and experience of neurosurgeons who perform epilepsy surgery, their educational paths, and opinions on the further need for epilepsy surgery education, as well as the resources available to them. We report a detailed analysis of the 202 survey replies received from 35 different countries across six continents. The lack of adequate numbers of epilepsy surgery units in the Southern Hemisphere is notable, and the aim of this task force with other ILAE committees, is to improve access to epilepsy surgery for patients and to enhance training for their health care providers.
全球多达80%的癫痫患者生活在低收入和中等收入国家。这些患者中约有三分之一会患有药物难治性癫痫，癫痫手术是一种治疗选择。不幸的是，这些地区中的许多地方以及一些更发达国家，都缺乏足够的癫痫手术科室和经过培训的神经外科医生。考虑到这一点，国际抗癫痫联盟（ILAE）成立了癫痫手术教育特别工作组，以解决外科医生和神经科医生进一步教育机会短缺的问题，并促进在全球建立更多的癫痫手术科室。在本文中，我们公布了一项基于网络的国际调查结果，在该调查中，我们调查了进行癫痫手术的神经外科医生的全球分布和经验、他们的教育路径、对癫痫手术教育进一步需求的看法，以及他们可利用的资源。我们报告了对从六大洲35个不同国家收到的202份调查问卷回复的详细分析。南半球癫痫手术科室数量不足的情况值得注意，该特别工作组与国际抗癫痫联盟的其他委员会的目标是，改善患者获得癫痫手术的机会，并加强对其医疗服务提供者的培训。
