Epilepsy Surgery

The treatment team for the University of Florida Comprehensive Epilepsy Program delivers advanced care to patients with epilepsy and other paroxysmal neurological disorders. The team includes neurologists, neuropsychologists, neuropathologists, neuroradiologists, neurosurgeons and nurse practitioners.

Steven N. Roper, M.D., performs all diagnostic and therapeutic epilepsy surgery procedures on adults and teens, and Jason Blatt, M.D., performs epilepsy procedures on children. Justin Hilliard, MD, is an adult epilepsy specialists who offers deep brain stimulation for epilepsy patients.

Program resources include the epilepsy monitoring unit at UF Health Shands Hospital, a state-of-the-art facility designed for long-term monitoring and evaluation of patients with epileptic seizures. The unit features four adult and two pediatric rooms equipped for comprehensive telemetric video electroencephalogram, or EEG, monitoring.

Since 1992, UF Health neurosurgeons have performed more than 1,525 epilepsy surgical procedures - more than any other epilepsy treatment program in Florida. For the 20 to 30 percent of patients who suffer from medically intractable epilepsy, UF Health neurosurgeons perform a careful evaluation to determine the most appropriate surgical treatment option. Once the seizure focus has been identified, surgical removal of that area can often be performed.

Many different surgical treatment options are available through the UF Health comprehensive epilepsy program. The goal is to remove the smallest possible amount of brain tissue to achieve a significant decrease in the frequency or severity of seizures, or to cure seizures completely.