Epilepsy is an illness, which is more understood than it was originally. There are
considerable improvements
in the treatment of epilepsy as well; as the enormous amount of time, effort and money which is being spent on constant research. There still is a misunderstanding of Epilepsy by the Society overall. therefore educational programs play a vital role to make more people aware of Epilepsy. I believe it is up to people who have Epilepsy to try and speak out about it rather than feeling ashamed, embarrassed, or guilty about it as has been proven for decades. Therefore Society cannot be blamed in essence. The sufferers must speak out more openly as well as seeing that the Foundation carries its duty to educate people from all walks of life. In the employment area it is good for staff to be made aware of Epilepsy in case one of the members may have it regardless of whether it is now or after an incident that can cause Epilepsy - e.g an accident that injured the persons brain can cause Epilepsy. There are other ways also, as there are 360 different kinds of Epilepsy altogether. Publicity is another area that needs to be increased in order to make more people aware as not everyone has a TV set, as well as people who cannot read, and depend on pictures and diagrams to get the story we can read, whereas a picture is worth 10,000 words. More than just over 80% of the jobs available on the market are suitable to epileptics, the few that aren’t are like - working near machinery, stepping up ladders, driving (except those who haven’t had a turn for two or more years. Everybody was and still is surrounded by fear and superstition, awareness has increased over the last 15 years although it is at a low profile, 80 per cent of epileptics are controllable, whilst the other 20 per cent still need research to the continuous in the medical land social areas. Very little publicity has been given over the years, and gradually more interest is growing slowly and gradually. More emphasis needs to be heightened in order to give society a better understanding and acknowledgement of the learning’s. Publicity in all formats need to be increased in order to be able to inform the people in differing forms of communication which is surrounded by barriers; which proves the importance of highlighting the matters in differing formats. The formats are to have the COMMUNICATION provide differing languages for the enormous amount of nationalities that surround us which proves the importance this holds; it also needs to be provided in tapes for those who are blind, and elderly people whose vision begin to become more difficult to read the literature, thereby by having the print in large print it will enable a large lot of people to be able to have more chance of finding out their way, whereas there are also those who cannot read and dwell on pictures which gives them more in-depth of the story from the photos which enables them to get the story, another point is where each picture the disabled who depend on them for their understanding of the story; it has been said that the pictures are worth one thousand (1000) words; whereas we tend to depend on the print outs which proves the enormous barriers in COMMUNICATION that we are surrounded by. From a personal viewpoint the organizations, media (radio, TV, and newspapers) as well as part of the professionals are more to blame than the parents and society. The reasons being: The parents are misled by (i) pamphlets; (ii) certain TV film stories; (iii) newspaper stories. The doctors in numerous cases I’ve known have asked the parent not to tell the child or friends that the child has a certain form of epilepsy, which in my opinion is unethical. The professionals in some cases hide the truth of their clients (epileptic) for undue reasons. The individual (epileptic) isnot recognised for his/her complaints of the way the organization/institution treats him, which pinpoints the reasons why SOCIETY is not to blame. One example is when a girl was boarding an Ansett flight to Sydney, as she was on the last step she had a fit. The radio, TV and newspapers were there straightaway, and she appeared in the evening news on TV and the front-page headlines of “The Herald” and on radio. In so doing the media reduces her chances to get accommodation at the YWCA in Russell Street and hostels in Melbourne. Whereas my father who was the president of the then organization was known as the Victorian Bureau for Epilepsy had come to the rescue of her by providing accommodation at the Powlett Street Hostel in East Melbourne. Just to prove that with a Disability can be of a worthwhile deed as in one instance back in the 1960s there was this occasion when at one of the beaches in Melbourne when I was out in the water a few yards away from the beach, there was this occurrence whilst being in the water my father was looking for me; he saw me and suddenly he called out to the life savers to attend to my drowning, they came straight away and it was amazing how they managed to resuscitate me from the drowning and I was more than thankful.