Examining the Validity of Screening Questions for Assessing Epilepsy

Boston University: Partners in Health and Housing Prevention Research Center

Topics:
Epilepsy

This project examines the usefulness of the five epilepsy-related questions in CDC’s Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System. The questions, about epilepsy diagnosis, medicine, seizure frequency, specialty care, and disease impact, are designed to assess the national prevalence and impact of epilepsy. Researchers will administer questionnaires that include the five questions to groups of people with and without epilepsy. Analysis of the answers and patient records will show how accurately the answers to the questions represent the truth. Specific measures of question value that will be measured throughout this study include sensitivity, specificity, positive and negative predictive values, reliability, and validity. The groups include 400 patients of the Boston Medical Center’s neurology and epilepsy clinics. These participants, who have received a diagnosis of epilepsy or have a history of seizures, will be matched by age and gender with patients having no diagnosis of epilepsy or seizure. The study will also include 100 people from the Framingham Heart Study who have a history of epilepsy and an equal-sized comparison group.

 

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