Infantile spasms (West syndrome).

West syndrome, otherwise known as infantile spasms, is an uncommon to rare and serious form of epilepsy in infants. It is named after the English physician, William James West (1793-1848), who first described it in an article published in The Lancet in 1841. Other names for it are “Generalized Flexion Epilepsy”, “Infantile Epileptic Encephalopathy”, “Infantile Myoclonic Encephalopathy”, “jackknife convulsions”, “Massive Myoclonia” and “Salaam spasms”. The name “infantile spasms” is used to describe both the seizure type and the syndrome.

Epilepsy.

Epilepsy is a common chronic neurological disorder that is characterized by recurrent unprovoked seizures. These seizures are transient signs and/or symptoms due to abnormal, excessive or synchronous neuronal activity in the brain. About 50 million people worldwide have epilepsy at any one time. Epilepsy is usually controlled, but not cured, with medication, although surgery may be considered in difficult cases. Not all epilepsy syndromes are lifelong – some forms are confined to particular stages of childhood. Epilepsy should not be understood as a single disorder, but rather as a group of syndromes with vastly divergent symptoms but all involving episodic abnormal electrical activity in the brain.

Eczma.

Eczema is a form of dermatitis, or inflammation of the upper layers of the skin.

The term eczema is broadly applied to a range of persistent skin conditions. These include dryness and recurring skin rashes which are characterized by one or more of these symptoms: redness, skin edema, itching and dryness, crusting, flaking, blistering, cracking, oozing, or bleeding. Areas of temporary skin discolouration may appear and are sometimes due to healed lesions, although scarring is rare.

Coeliac disease.

Coeliac disease, also spelled celiac disease, is an autoimmune disorder of the small bowel that occurs in genetically predisposed people of all ages from middle infancy. Symptoms include chronic diarrhoea, failure to thrive (in children) and fatigue, but these may be absent and symptoms in all other organ systems have been described. It is estimated to affect about 1% of Indo-European populations, but is significantly underdiagnosed. A growing portion of diagnoses are being made in asymptomatic persons as a result of increasing screening.

Lactose intolerance.

Lactose intolerance refers to the inability to metabolize lactose, a sugar found in milk and other dairy products, due to the absence or decline of the required enzyme lactase. One estimate puts 70% of adults as lactose intolerant.