Photo by: Robin Scholz/The News-Gazette
Megan Althoff demonstrates equipment at Carle Foundation Hospital's new epilepsy center in Urbana. Watching is Dan Turpin, neurology and sleep lab manager.
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URBANA Local children and adults with epilepsy now have a treatment center close to home.
A new epilepsy center at Carle's main Urbana campus is treating patients who had to travel as far as Springfield, St. Louis or Chicago for specialized care for the potentially life-threatening condition that causes chronic seizures, Carle officials say.
The new center has two epilepsy specialists, one for adults and one for children and offers such services as a 24-hour monitoring unit for diagnosis, inpatient treatment for the acutely ill, illness management for outpatients and epilepsy surgery.
It will also be involved in research with the Beckman Institute at the University of Illinois, with patients already being recruited for the first of three projects, says Dr. Graham Huesmann, an epilepsy specialist treating adults at the new center.
Huesmann came to Carle from a neurology residency and two-year fellowship at Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School.
What drew him here was the chance to establish an epilepsy treatment program in an area where there was a need, he said. Plus, he liked the connection it offers to research at the UI, where he received his MD/PhD.
Huesmann said he aims to end seizures for his patients, and while success depends on the individual patient, "that is my goal."
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Carle has new epilepsy center