Abstract
OBJECTIVES: in the present article a search of famous and not so famous women with epilepsy is made throughout the time, from Ancient Times to Modern and Contemporary ages.
DEVELOPMENT: No other disease allows us to overcome in the history of medicine as epilepsy does. From the earliest times, epilepsy was regarded as evidence of something special. Whenever famous personalities with epilepsy are written about, names of leaders as Saint Paul, Julius Cesar and Alexander the Great; poets and novelists such as Byron, Dostoevsky and Edgar Allan Poe and painters as Van Gogh always crop up with a positive image of epilepsy. Here is a display of thirteen famous an not so famous women who have had or who are said to have had epilepsy.
CONCLUSIONS: many famous people have had epilepsy, thirteen cases of women with epilepsy who have excelled in different fields throughout history are presented.
References
García-Albea E. Praelectiones Vallisoletanae (1961), de Antonio Ponce de Santa Cruz, el primer gran tratado español sobre la epilepsia. Rev Neurol 1998; 101-105.
García-Albea E. La epilepsia en el Renacimiento español. La obra del alcalaíno Pérez Cascal. Rev Neurol 1999; 29: 467-469.
Vanzan Paladin A. Women and epilepsy in the Mediterranean cultures. Ital J Neurol Sci 1997; 18: 221-223.
Vercelletto P. Saint Paul disease. Ectasia and exstatic seizures. Rev Neurol (Paris) 1994; 150: 835-839.
Brorson JR, Brewer K. St Paul and temporal lobe epilepsy. J Neurol Neurosurg Psychiatry 1988; 51: 886-887.
Gastaut H. New comments on the epilepsy of Fyodor Dostoevsky. Epilepsia 1984; 25: 408-411.
Foote-Smith E, Smith TJ. Emanuel Swedenborg. Epilepsia 1996; 37: 211-218.
Bazil CW. Seizures in the life and works of Edgar Allen Poe. Arch Neurol 1999; 56: 740-743.
Ozer IJ. Images of epilepsy in literature. Epilepsia 1991; 32: 798-809.
Trimble MR. Women and Epilepsy. Chichester, England: John Wiley & Sons; 1991.
Devinsky O. Religious experiences and epilepsy. Epilepsy Behav 2003; 4: 76-77.
Ratnasuriya RH. Joan of Arc, creative psycopath: is there another explanation? R Soc Med 1986; 79: 234-235
Foote-Smith E, Bayne L. Joan of Arc. Epilepsia 1991; 32: 810-815.
Dewhurst K, Beard AW. Sudden religious conversions in temporal lobe epilepsy. Br J Psychiatry 1970; 117: 497-508.
Sackville-West, V. The Eagle and the Dove. London:Michael Joseph; 1943.
The Catholic Encyclopedia. Volume III. Copyright 1908 by Robert Appleton Company. Online Edition Copyright 2003 by Kevin Knight.Nihil Obstat, November 1, 1908. Remy Lafort, S.T.D., Censor. Imprimatur. John Cardinal Farley, Archbishop of New York
Leuba JH. The Psychology of Religious Mystics. London: Kegan Paul; 1925.
DeToledo JC, DeToledo MB, Lowe M. Epilepsy and sudden death: notes from George Washington’s diaries on the illness and death of Martha Parke-Custis (1756-1773)- Epilepsia 1999; 40: 1835-1836.
Bradford SH. Harriet the Moses of her people. New York: Geo R. Lockwood & Son; 1886. Edición electrónicas. URL http//docsouth.unc.edu/harriet/harriet [fecha de acceso 12 de agosto de 2003]
DeToledo JC, DeToledo BB, Lowe M. The epilepsy of First Lady Ida Saxton McKinley. South Med J 2000; 93: 267-271.
Epilepsy Toronto. URL: www.epilesytoronto.org/ people/eaupdate/vol9.html [fecha de acceso agosto 12 de 2003]
Museo de epilepsia. URL: www. epilepsiemuseum. de [fecha de acceso septiembre 04 de 2003]
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.