A Multidisciplinary Approach to Nonepileptic Events With Dr. Adriana Bermeo-Ovalle
03/19/25 • 24 min
Nonepileptic events are prevalent and highly disabling, and multiple pathophysiologic mechanisms for these events have been proposed. Multidisciplinary care teams enable the efficient use of individual expertise at different treatment stages to address presentation, risk factors, and comorbidities.
In this episode, Kait Nevel, MD, speaks with Adriana C. Bermeo-Ovalle, MD, an author of the article “A Multidisciplinary Approach to Nonepileptic Events,” in the Continuum® February 2025 Epilepsy issue.
Dr. Nevel is a Continuum® Audio interviewer and a neurologist and neuro-oncologist at Indiana University School of Medicine in Indianapolis, Indiana.
Dr. Bermeo-Ovalle is a professor and vice-chair for Faculty Affairs in the Department of Neurological Sciences at Rush University Medical Center in Chicago, Illinois.
Additional Resources
Read the article: A Multidisciplinary Approach to Nonepileptic Events
Subscribe to Continuum: shop.lww.com/Continuum
Earn CME (available only to AAN members): continpub.com/AudioCME
Continuum® Aloud (verbatim audio-book style recordings of articles available only to Continuum® subscribers): continpub.com/Aloud
More about the American Academy of Neurology: aan.com
Social Media
Host: @IUneurodocmom
Full episode transcript available here
Dr. Jones: This is Dr Lyell Jones, Editor-in-Chief of Continuum, the premier topic-based neurology clinical review and CME journal from the American Academy of Neurology. Thank you for joining us on Continuum Audio, which features conversations with Continuum's guest editors and authors who are the leading experts in their fields. Subscribers to the Continuum Journal can read the full article or listen to verbatim recordings of the article and have access to exclusive interviews not featured on the podcast. Please visit the link in the episode notes for more information on the article, subscribing to the journal, and how to get CME.
Dr Nevel: Hello, this is Dr Kait Nevel. Today I'm interviewing Dr Adriana Bermeo about her article on a multidisciplinary approach to nonepileptic events, which she wrote with Dr Victor Petron. This article appears in the February 2025 Continuum issue on epilepsy. Welcome to the podcast, and please introduce yourself to our audience.
Dr Bermeo-Ovalle: Hello Dr Neville, it's a pleasure to be here. Thank you very much for inviting me. My name is Adriana Bermeo and I'm an adult epileptologist at Rush University Medical Center in Chicago, and I am also the codirector of the NEST clinic, which is a treatment clinic for patients with nonepileptic seizures within our level four epilepsy center.
Dr Nevel: Wonderful. Well, thank you so much for being here, and I can't wait to talk to you about your article and learn a little bit about NEST, maybe, during our conversation, and how you approach things. To start us off talking about your article today, could you share with us what you think is the most important takeaway from your article for the practicing neurologist?
Dr Bermeo-Ovalle: Wonderful. There's some messages that I would like people to get from working with patients with functional neurologic disorders in general. The first one is that functional neurologic disorders are very common in presentation in the neurologic clinic, almost no matter what your practice of self-specialty care is. The second is that for people who treat patients primarily with seizures or epilepsy, they account for between 5 to 10% of our patients in the clinic, but about 30% of our patients in our epilepsy monitoring unit because the seizures typically do not respond to anti-seizure medication management. Also, that in order to diagnose them, you don't need to have a neuropsychological stress already be available for the patient or the clinician. And the most important thing is...
Nonepileptic events are prevalent and highly disabling, and multiple pathophysiologic mechanisms for these events have been proposed. Multidisciplinary care teams enable the efficient use of individual expertise at different treatment stages to address presentation, risk factors, and comorbidities.
In this episode, Kait Nevel, MD, speaks with Adriana C. Bermeo-Ovalle, MD, an author of the article “A Multidisciplinary Approach to Nonepileptic Events,” in the Continuum® February 2025 Epilepsy issue.
Dr. Nevel is a Continuum® Audio interviewer and a neurologist and neuro-oncologist at Indiana University School of Medicine in Indianapolis, Indiana.
Dr. Bermeo-Ovalle is a professor and vice-chair for Faculty Affairs in the Department of Neurological Sciences at Rush University Medical Center in Chicago, Illinois.
Additional Resources
Read the article: A Multidisciplinary Approach to Nonepileptic Events
Subscribe to Continuum: shop.lww.com/Continuum
Earn CME (available only to AAN members): continpub.com/AudioCME
Continuum® Aloud (verbatim audio-book style recordings of articles available only to Continuum® subscribers): continpub.com/Aloud
More about the American Academy of Neurology: aan.com
Social Media
Host: @IUneurodocmom
Full episode transcript available here
Dr. Jones: This is Dr Lyell Jones, Editor-in-Chief of Continuum, the premier topic-based neurology clinical review and CME journal from the American Academy of Neurology. Thank you for joining us on Continuum Audio, which features conversations with Continuum's guest editors and authors who are the leading experts in their fields. Subscribers to the Continuum Journal can read the full article or listen to verbatim recordings of the article and have access to exclusive interviews not featured on the podcast. Please visit the link in the episode notes for more information on the article, subscribing to the journal, and how to get CME.
Dr Nevel: Hello, this is Dr Kait Nevel. Today I'm interviewing Dr Adriana Bermeo about her article on a multidisciplinary approach to nonepileptic events, which she wrote with Dr Victor Petron. This article appears in the February 2025 Continuum issue on epilepsy. Welcome to the podcast, and please introduce yourself to our audience.
Dr Bermeo-Ovalle: Hello Dr Neville, it's a pleasure to be here. Thank you very much for inviting me. My name is Adriana Bermeo and I'm an adult epileptologist at Rush University Medical Center in Chicago, and I am also the codirector of the NEST clinic, which is a treatment clinic for patients with nonepileptic seizures within our level four epilepsy center.
Dr Nevel: Wonderful. Well, thank you so much for being here, and I can't wait to talk to you about your article and learn a little bit about NEST, maybe, during our conversation, and how you approach things. To start us off talking about your article today, could you share with us what you think is the most important takeaway from your article for the practicing neurologist?
Dr Bermeo-Ovalle: Wonderful. There's some messages that I would like people to get from working with patients with functional neurologic disorders in general. The first one is that functional neurologic disorders are very common in presentation in the neurologic clinic, almost no matter what your practice of self-specialty care is. The second is that for people who treat patients primarily with seizures or epilepsy, they account for between 5 to 10% of our patients in the clinic, but about 30% of our patients in our epilepsy monitoring unit because the seizures typically do not respond to anti-seizure medication management. Also, that in order to diagnose them, you don't need to have a neuropsychological stress already be available for the patient or the clinician. And the most important thing is...
Previous Episode
Surgical Treatments, Devices, and Nonmedical Management of Epilepsy With Dr. Daniel Friedman
Many patients with epilepsy are unable to acheive optimal seizure control with medical therapy. Palliative surgical procedures, neurostimulation devices, and other nonpharmalogical treatments can lead to a meaningful reduction in seizures and improved outcomes.
In this episode, Teshamae Monteith, MD FAAN, speaks with Daniel Friedman, MD, MSc, author of the article “Surgical Treatments, Devices, and Nonmedical Management of Epilepsy,” in the Continuum® February 2025 Epilepsy issue.
Dr. Montieth is a Continuum® Audio interviewer and an associate editor of Continuum® Audio and an associate professor of clinical neurology at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine in Miami, Florida.
Dr. Friedman is a professor (clinical) of neurology at NYU Grossman School of Medicine and Director of NYU Langone Comprehensive Epilepsy Center at NYU Langone Health in New York, New York.
Additional Resources
Read the article: Surgical Treatments, Devices, and Nonmedical Management of Epilepsy
Subscribe to Continuum: shop.lww.com/Continuum
Earn CME (available only to AAN members): continpub.com/AudioCME
Continuum® Aloud (verbatim audio-book style recordings of articles available only to Continuum® subscribers): continpub.com/Aloud
More about the American Academy of Neurology: aan.com
Social Media
Host: @headacheMD
Guest: @dfriedman36
Full episode transcript available here
Dr Jones: This is Dr Lyell Jones, Editor-in-Chief of Continuum, the premier topic-based neurology clinical review and CME journal from the American Academy of Neurology. Thank you for joining us on Continuum Audio, which features conversations with Continuum's guest editors and authors who are the leading experts in their fields. Subscribers to the Continuum Journal can read the full article or listen to verbatim recordings of the article and have access to exclusive interviews not featured on the podcast. Please visit the link in the episode notes for more information on the article, subscribing to the journal, and how to get CME.
Dr Monteith: This is Dr Teshamae Monteith. Today, I'm interviewing Dr Daniel Friedman about his article on surgical treatments, devices, tools, and non-medication management of epilepsy, which appears in the February 2025 Continuum issue on epilepsy. Welcome to the podcast. How are you?
Dr Friedman: I'm well, how are you?
Dr Monteith: Thank you for your article.
Dr Friedman: Thank you for the opportunity to talk today.
Dr Monteith: Why don't you introduce yourself?
Dr Friedman: So yeah, so I'm Dan Friedman. I am a professor of neurology here at NYU Grossman School of Medicine and I am the director of the NYU Comprehensive Epilepsy Center. I'm primarily an adult neurologist and I treat teens and adults with hard- difficult-to-treat epilepsy, including surgical treatments for epilepsy.
Dr Monteith: And I know you see a lot of patients because I did my residency there. And so, when you graduate, you get a lot of it, like I think many, many residents. What inspired you to choose epilepsy as a profession?
Dr Friedman: I came to neurology through my interest in neuroscience. I was a neuroscience undergraduate. I was very interested in the brain and brain function. Particularly, I was interested in how neurons communicate and organize to entrain and rhythms and that encode information. And through that interest and through my experiences in the laboratory, I actually became interested in how they do that in pathological circumstances like seizures. And so, I started reading about epilepsy, and then when I started seeing patients with epilepsy, you know, I decided this is the specialty for me for a lot of reasons. One is it combines inpatient and outpatient care. You get to establish long-term re...
Next Episode
Diversity and Underserved Patient Populations in Epilepsy With Dr. Dave Clarke
Despite advances in epilepsy management, disparities and lack of inclusion of many people with epilepsy are associated with increased morbidity and mortality. Improving awareness and promoting diversity in research participation can advance treatment for underserved populations and improve trust.
In this episode, Teshamae Monteith, MD, PhD, FAAN speaks Dave F. Clarke, MBBS, FAES, author of the article “Diversity and Underserved Patient Populations in Epilepsy,” in the Continuum® February 2025 Epilepsy issue.
Dr. Monteith is a Continuum® Audio interviewer and an associate editor of Continuum® Audio and an associate professor of clinical neurology at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine in Miami, Florida.
Dr. Clarke is the Kozmetsky Family Foundation Endowed Chair of Pediatric Epilepsy and Chief or Comprehensive Pediatric Epilepsy Center, Dell Medical School at the University of Texas at Austin in Austin, Texas.
Additional Resources
Read the article: Diversity and Underserved Patient Populations in Epilepsy
Subscribe to Continuum: shop.lww.com/Continuum
Earn CME (available only to AAN members): continpub.com/AudioCME
Continuum® Aloud (verbatim audio-book style recordings of articles available only to Continuum® subscribers): continpub.com/Aloud
More about the American Academy of Neurology: aan.com
Social Media
Host: @HeadacheMD
Full episode transcript available here
Dr Jones: This is Dr Lyell Jones, Editor-in-Chief of Continuum, the premier topic-based neurology clinical review and CME journal from the American Academy of Neurology. Thank you for joining us on Continuum Audio, which features conversations with Continuum's guest editors and authors who are the leading experts in their fields. Subscribers to the Continuum Journal can read the full article or listen to verbatim recordings of the article and have access to exclusive interviews not featured on the podcast. Please visit the link in the episode notes for more information on the article, subscribing to the journal, and how to get CME.
Dr Monteith: This is Dr Teshamae Monteith. Today I'm interviewing Dr Dave Clarke about his article on diversity and underserved patient populations in epilepsy, which appears in the February 2025 Continuum issue on epilepsy. So why don't you introduce yourself to our audience?
Dr Clarke: Sure. My name is Dr Dave Clarke, as alluded to. I'm presently at the University of Texas in Austin, originating from much farther south. I'm from Antigua, but have been here for quite a while working within the field in epilepsy surgery, but more and more getting involved in outreach, access to care, and equity of healthcare in epilepsy.
Dr Monteith: And how did you get involved in this kind of work?
Dr Clarke: That's an amazing question. You know, I did it in a bit of a inside out fashion. I initially started working in the field and trying to get access to persons in the Caribbean that didn't have any neurological care or investigative studies, but very quickly realized that persons around the corner here in Texas and wherever I’ve worked have had the exact same problems, getting access via fiscal or otherwise epilepsy care, or geographically getting access, with so few having neurologists close at hand. Therefore, I started working both on a regional, national, and it transcended to a global scale.
Dr Monteith: Wow, so you're just everywhere.
Dr Clarke: Well, building bridges. I've found building bridges and helping with knowledge and garnering knowledge, you can expand your reach without actually moving, which is quite helpful.
Dr Monteith: Yeah. So why don't you tell us why you think this work is so important in issues of diversity, underserved populations, and of course, access to epilepsy care?
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