1. Jonathan Darmawan and Afrid Sunesara

2. What it is
Epilepsy is a brain disorder that causes recurring seizures.
These seizures are caused by clusters of neurons sending out wrong signals.
During seizures, people may have strange sensations and emotions or behave strangely. They may also have violent muscle spasms or lose consciousness.

3. Causes There are many causes including: Illness Strokes Brain injury
Brain infection
Abnormal brain development
In many cases the cause is unknown

4. Diagnosis
Doctors use brain scans to test epilepsy. Medical history also helps with diagnosis.
Signs
Seizures:
Generalized tonic-clonic (grand mal) seizures - Affects the whole brain. Muscles in the body become stiff. The person usually loses consciousness.
Absence (or petit mal) seizures - Affects the whole brain, and usually only lasts a few seconds. May be unaware of his or her surroundings, suddenly stop moving, or have small changes in muscle movements.
Partial (focal) seizures - Affects only one part of the brain. Symptoms vary based on which part of the brain is affected.
Symptoms
Dizziness
Emotional changes
Changes in vision (such as hallucinations)
Smell (smelling an odor that isn’t there)
Touch (such as numbness or tingling)

5. Treatment
It is important to start treatment right away. There are no cures however there is medicine to control the seizures for most people. Alternative treatments include surgery or devices such as vagus nerve stimulator. Special diets can help with children with this disease.

6. Famous People With Epilepsy
AUTHORS:
Charles Dickens
Dante
Sir Walter Scott
Lord Byron
Alfred, Lord Tennyson
Moliere
Lewis Carroll
Fyodor Dostoevsky
Leo Tolstoy
Gustave Flaubert
Agatha Christie
Truman Capote
Edgar Allen Poe
SPORTS FIGURES:
Tony Greig (Cricket)
Terry Marsh (Boxer)
Greg Walker (Baseball)
Wally Lewis (Rugby)
Paul Wade (Aussie Football)
Allen Faneca (NFL)
Chandra Gunn (Women's Hockey)
Bobby Jones (Basketball)
Garry Howatt (NHL)
Derek Morris (NHL)
MILITARY & POLITICAL LEADERS:
Alexander the Great
Julius Caesar
Hannibal
King Louis XIII (France)
King Charles V (Spain)
Napolean Bonaparte
Peter the Great
Vladimir Lenin
Theodore Roosevelt (U.S. President)
James Madison (U.S. President)
RELIGIOUS LEADERS:
Saint Paul
Joan of Arc
Martin Luther
Pope Pius IX
PHILOSOPHERS:
Socrates
Aristotle
Pythagoras
PAINTERS:
Leonardo Da Vinci
Vincent Van Gogh
Michelangelo
COMPOSERS:
Paganini
Tchaikovsky
Beethoven
Handel
George Gershwin
Schumann
ACTORS:
Michael Wilding
Margaux Hemingway
Richard Burton
Danny Glover
Bud Abbott
Ward Bond
SCIENTISTS:
Alfred Nobel
Sir Isaac Newton
Thomas Edison

7. Fun Facts
Ancient people thought epileptic seizures were caused by evil spirits or demons that invaded a person's body. Priests tried to cure people with epilepsy by driving the demons out of them with magic and prayers.
The superstition was challenged by physicians like Atreya of India and later Hippocrates of Greece, both recognized a seizure as a dysfunction of the brain and not a supernatural event.
Aristotle was apparently the first to connect epilepsy and genius.

8. Bibliography https://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/epilepsy.html
conditions/epilepsy.printerview.all.html