Clinic Guidelines
The New Onset Seizure Clinic team at Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center provides some general guidelines about our clinic.
Clinical Trials / Research Studies
Who, When and How to Call
You should contact the nurse regarding any seizures or side effects from the medication. Please be sure that you contact the appropriate nurse (Lisa Heaton) so that you receive a prompt reply.
Please leave a message on the nurses' voice mail and we will call you back as soon as possible. We can adjust your child's medication over the phone, if necessary. If your child has many seizures over the course of the day/week, we will work with you to determine how often you need to call the nurse.
Office hours are from 8 am - 4 pm.
Urgent Matters
For urgent matters during the day, please ask for the "urgent nurse." If it is an urgent matter after hours, follow the telephone prompts and the answering service will page the "doctor on call". Please also leave the nurse (Lisa) a voicemail detailing the urgent call and any changes that were made to your child's regimen.
Follow-Up Appointments
You are responsible for making your child's follow-up appointments and scheduling tests, unless otherwise specified. Your child will have a clinic visit approximately every three months for the first year and then every six months.
New onset seizure follow-up clinics are staffed by a nurse practitioner. Your child will see the nurse practitioner at every visit with an annual exam conducted by a doctor. However, doctors are available anytime to the nurse practitioner if consultation regarding your child's care is needed.
Medication
It is important that seizure medication be taken consistently every day to sustain drug levels. This is what will help protect your child from "breakthrough" seizures. Please bring a complete list of your child's medications to every clinic, including the drug and the dosage in milligrams.
Keeping Us Updated
Please supply daytime telephone numbers where you can be reached to avoid a lot of "telephone tag." Also, please call the office if your telephone number and/or address changes.
