International Epilepsy Day 2026
Turn one pledge into a measurable improvement in seizure safety, access, inclusion, or continuity.
A pledge matters when the operating system changes.
Epilepsy care spans diagnosis, medication access, specialty care, seizure action plans, emergency response, education, employment, and protection from stigma.
The Epilepsy Pledge gives leaders a disciplined choice: select one concrete action, define the owner and measure, and keep it visible beyond the awareness day.
Epilepsy is not one uniform operating problem. Seizure types, frequency, recovery, treatment response, comorbidities, age, and daily-life risks vary. Measures therefore need a person-centered denominator and should not imply that one clinical outcome is appropriate or achievable for everyone. The pledge should improve a defined barrier or safety condition while preserving individualized clinical decisions.
First-aid readiness is a useful example because it reaches beyond neurology. Emergency departments, primary care, schools, behavioral health settings, employers, residential services, and public-facing teams may all encounter seizures. Training should be paired with a simple response standard, clear emergency thresholds, privacy guidance, and an accessible route for questions. Completion counts alone do not prove that responders can act safely.
Access reviews should separate the steps that are often collapsed into one referral measure: referral received, urgency assessed, appointment offered, appointment completed, testing completed, treatment plan communicated, and medication obtained. Seeing each step helps leaders distinguish capacity constraints from communication or navigation failures and assign the right owner.
The same discipline should apply to seizure action plans. A plan is only useful when it is current, understandable, available with consent, and paired with the supplies or rescue medication it references. Sampling plans across care settings can reveal outdated instructions, conflicting thresholds, or missing caregiver education before those gaps become an emergency.
Choose one pledge with people living with epilepsy, such as seizure first-aid readiness or faster specialty access, and make its owner, baseline, and 12-month target public internally.
WHO estimates that around 50 million people worldwide have epilepsy.
Nearly 80% of people with epilepsy live in low- and middle-income countries.
WHO estimates that up to 70% of people with epilepsy could live seizure-free if properly diagnosed and treated.
Figures are summarized from the authoritative sources linked below. Definitions and denominators should be read with each source.
Connect recognition, diagnosis, treatment, and everyday safety.
The route should work in clinics, emergency settings, schools, workplaces, and community spaces.
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Recognize and respond
Teach seizure first aid, time the seizure, protect the person from injury, and use clear emergency thresholds.
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Diagnose and classify
Create a timely path for first-seizure evaluation, appropriate testing, and specialist review based on clinical need.
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Treat and monitor
Support medication access, adherence conversations, side-effect review, and escalation when seizures remain uncontrolled.
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Include and support
Address stigma, safety planning, mental health, school or work accommodation, driving guidance, and caregiver needs.
Reliability rule: A seizure action plan must be accessible to the people expected to use it and aligned with the individual’s clinical plan.
Measure access, safety, and inclusion.
Use measures that reflect the chosen pledge and avoid treating seizure freedom as a simple performance target for every person.
First-seizure follow-up
Track the interval from acute evaluation or referral to the appropriate clinical follow-up.
Action-plan availability
Confirm that eligible people have a current, usable seizure action plan.
First-aid readiness
Measure trained staff in settings where seizure response is likely.
Access interruption
Monitor medication, specialist, testing, and transportation barriers.
Transfer the seizure story and the safety plan.
The receiving team needs an accurate event description, current medications, recovery course, and the agreed next action.
Community or EMS to emergency care
- Report seizure duration and observed features.
- Transfer injuries, breathing concerns, medications, and known history.
- Share the person’s action plan when available.
Emergency care to neurology or primary care
- Send testing, treatment, pending results, and urgency.
- Schedule or actively connect follow-up.
- Explain return precautions and safety guidance.
Clinical team to daily settings
- Create the plan with the person and caregiver.
- Share only with consent and protect privacy.
- Train the designated school, work, or community responders.
Privacy, autonomy, and safety should be designed together, not traded against each other without the person’s participation.
Ask whether the pledge is changing practice.
Review the pledge through an established quality or community-benefit forum.
| Signal | Executive question | Accountable owner | Review cadence |
|---|---|---|---|
| Access | Can people complete timely first-seizure and specialty follow-up? | Neurology and access leaders | Monthly |
| Safety | Are action plans current, understandable, and available where needed? | Clinical operations | Quarterly |
| Readiness | Have priority staff completed approved seizure first-aid training? | Education and safety | Monthly |
| Inclusion | Are stigma or accommodation barriers being identified and resolved? | Patient experience and community partners | Quarterly |
Deliver one Epilepsy Pledge in 90 days.
Make the commitment narrow enough to execute and meaningful enough to matter.
Write the pledge as a measurable service promise. Specify the population or setting, the concrete action, the baseline, the target date, the accountable owner, and how people with epilepsy will judge whether the change helped. Review unintended effects, including privacy concerns or policies that restrict participation in the name of safety. A strong pledge expands safety and inclusion together rather than improving one by sacrificing the other.
Choose with the community
- Listen to people with epilepsy and caregivers.
- Map current safety and access failures.
- Set one baseline and target.
Put the pledge into practice
- Pilot one action-plan or first-aid workflow.
- Assign open tasks to named owners.
- Review every exception for learning, not blame.
Keep the pledge
- Compare results with baseline.
- Extend the workflow to the next priority setting.
- Report progress and the next action to participants.
Turn stories into one accountable action.
International Epilepsy Day 2026 asks organizations to move from awareness to a pledge that can be seen, measured, and sustained.
Turn International Epilepsy Day into accountable action.
Turn one pledge into a measurable improvement in seizure safety, access, inclusion, or continuity.
Leadership focus
Use this observance to examine navigation, longitudinal ownership, and specialty-care coordination. Select one verified barrier, assign an accountable owner, and carry the improvement beyond the campaign window.
Workforce lens
Ask whether staffing, role clarity, training, tools, workload, and escalation support the people operating the information, assessment navigation, support, and longitudinal follow-through pathway.
Patient and community lens
Make the approved first step clear. Test whether a person can move from information to an acknowledged next action without navigating conflicting instructions.
Equity and access lens
Review communication access, cognitive accessibility, caregiver burden, transportation, digital access, and geographic availability.
Inspect the operating sequence
Listen with people using the pathway, caregivers, clinical teams, rehabilitation, and community supports. Find one fragmented information, a failed transition, or an unresolved support need, then test the locally approved route from entry through acknowledged follow-through.
- 01Recognize and respond
- 02Diagnose and classify
- 03Treat and monitor
- 04Include and support
Leadership actions for this week
- Name an executive sponsor and frontline operating owner.
- Ask people using and operating the pathway where ownership becomes unclear.
- Test one representative route from first question to acknowledged next step.
- Select one barrier that can be corrected without overstating the evidence.
- Set a review date and define how completion will be verified.
Candidate measures
Define every numerator, denominator where relevant, owner, data source, exclusions, cadence, and limitation locally. These are management prompts, not external benchmarks.
- Median and 90th-percentile days to completed follow-up
- Current plans documented and shared with consent
- Priority-site staff completing approved seizure first-aid training
Department readiness checklist
- The public and staff entry points match the actual approved process.
- A specific role accepts each request, referral, or escalation.
- Handoffs include acknowledgment and a visible unresolved state.
- Language, disability, digital, transportation, and trust barriers receive explicit review.
- Communications do not introduce unsupported themes, statistics, or clinical advice.
- A named leader will review what changed after the observance.
Intended audiences
- Executive and Operational Leaders
- Patient Experience and Access Leaders
Staff communication template
During International Epilepsy Day, our organization will connect awareness with a practical review of the information, assessment navigation, support, and longitudinal follow-through pathway. Use approved information, identify the correct entry point, confirm ownership when work moves, protect privacy, and escalate unresolved barriers through local channels.
Community communication template
International Epilepsy Day is an opportunity to share trustworthy information and make the next step easier to find. Use our approved channels for information and support. If a request changes hands, our goal is to keep ownership and follow-through visible.
Measurement worksheet
- Signal
- What observable condition will show whether the route works?
- Definition
- What is included, excluded, and counted?
- Owner
- Who reviews the signal and acts on exceptions?
- Cadence
- When will leaders review it?
- Equity check
- Which differences require protected, locally appropriate review?
- Closure
- What evidence will confirm the improvement was completed?
Authoritative resources
- International Epilepsy Day 2026, International League Against Epilepsy
- International Epilepsy Day, International Bureau for Epilepsy and International League Against Epilepsy
- Epilepsy Fact Sheet, World Health Organization
- First Aid for Seizures, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
- Epilepsy Health and Safety Concerns, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
Safety note: Call 911 if a seizure lasts longer than five minutes, another seizure starts soon after, the person has trouble breathing or waking, is injured, is in water, is pregnant, has diabetes with loss of consciousness, or has never had a seizure before. Do not restrain the person or put anything in the mouth.
ILAE and IBE confirm Monday, February 9, 2026 and the official theme, The Epilepsy Pledge. Emergency thresholds are summarized from CDC seizure first-aid guidance.