SOP: First-ever epileptic seizure in adult patients

About 5% of all adults will have at least one epileptic seizure in their life. The incidence of all unprovoked seizures ranges from approximately 50 to 70 /100,000. The very first epileptic seizure in an adult can be a very decisive event and demands a great deal of responsibility on the part of the treating clinician. Optimal clinical work-up and systematic decision-making are necessary to ensure adequate treatment as well as to avoid unnecessary treatment, such as life-long application of anticonvulsants that may not be indicated.

To present a pragmatic standard operating procedure (SOP) for approaching the first seizure in adults.

Based on current recommendations and personal suggestions, an SOP in the form of a flow chart accompanied with topical explanations and tables was created.

Approaching the first seizure should start with obtaining bystander information on the seizure and its clinical features. Then, differential diagnoses should be considered. The diagnostic work-up hast to contain a neurological and physical examination, emergency blood tests and cerebral imaging. This should allow to differentiate an unprovoked from an acute symptomatic seizure, i.e. triggered by current specific and identifiable structural or metabolic cause that should be eliminated if possible. In the case of an unprovoked seizure, estimation of seizure recurrence is necessary for the decision to start treatment with antiepileptic drugs.

The challenge of diagnostic work-up and treatment decisions after a first epileptic seizure in adults may be facilitated by a systematic, SOP-based approach.