EPILEPSY MANAGEMENT AT WORK ENVIRONMENT: ASPECTS OF OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH AND SAFETY

Abstract

Objective: There is a need to manage epilepsy, which is a common neurological disease, in terms of occupational health and safety at work environment. Numerous individuals with epilepsy is a part of the working population. Main problems are disease perception of patients, employers and coworkers, the severity and control of seizures, social acceptance by community, negative beliefs, attitudes and behaviors that affect negatively quality of life of both patients and their relatives at work environment for managing epilepsy. In order to cope with these difficulties in the management of epilepsy, every country needs to develop, implement and renew periodically their own epilepsy guides according to the socio-cultural structure. Various guidelines which are used for managing epilepsy and followed by occupational health and safety organizations are available in most of the countries. There are recommendations, which are including sample case presentations, to protect physical, mental and social health of employees with a disability such as epilepsy at work environment in these guidelines. These recommendations consist of valuable informations in terms of coping with problems that especially workers with epilepsy may encounter when they do job work. In this study, it was aimed to present knowledge on perception of epilepsy, epidemiology and epilepsy management through international epilepsy guides, publications, and case presentations in the work environment. In conclusion, we consider that developing and renewing periodically of epilepsy guidelines and training with case presentations may be beneficial in order to be successful in the management of epilepsy at work environment accordingly socio-cultural organizational structure in Turkey.