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Inheritance & Epilepsy Everybody inherits a unique degree of susceptibility to seizures. 9% of people have a seizure at some time in their life. Some people are so resistant to seizures that they never have one. Others have a genetic makeup that makes it very easy to have seizures. If there is no family history of epilepsy, about 3% of the population will have more than one seizure in their lives. However, fewer than 1% will require treatment for any long period of time. If one parent has epilepsy, the risk to the children is doubled to about 6%. If both parents or one parent and a brother or sister have epilepsy, the risk is about 10%. Genetics plays an important role in so called idiopathic epilepsy (meaning epilepsy of unknown cause) such as absence seizures and simple generalized tonic-clonic seizures. Genetics plays a secondary role in the development of complex partial seizures later in life. In this case, the frequency of the seizures, rather than the likelihood of developing epilepsy, is most heavily influenced by heredity. A genetic counselor is very helpful in giving guidance about the inheritability in a given family.
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