14 May 2012 Last updated at 20:51 ET By Philippa Roxby Health reporter, BBC News
Epileptic seizures are a frightening experience for anyone, but particularly for children who cannot control their seizures with medication.
For these children, and their parents, life can often be difficult and unpredictable.
However, if a particular part of the brain can be pinpointed as the cause of the seizures, brain surgery can be an effective treatment.
Great Ormond Street Hospital in London is currently the main centre in the UK for this type of specialised surgery, but Bristol, Manchester/Liverpool and Birmingham are set to develop similar expertise later this year.
As a result, doctors say they will be able to treat three times as many children with drug-resistant epilepsy in England and Wales - from 125 to around 350 each year by 2015-2016.
Rachel, from Essex, was nearly eight years old when surgeons at Great Ormond Street removed a piece of malformed tissue on the right-hand side of her brain.
My wife couldn't go further than 15 minutes from school in case Rachel collapsed.
Rachel and her family had spent years experimenting with different drugs, trying to control her sudden and distressing seizures which left her physically drained, reclusive and withdrawn.
Her father Nick says it was a relief when doctors said they had identified the root cause of the problem.
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Epilepsy children in surgery plan