Revisiting Survey Investigating Why Patients Are Not Receiving Home Anti-convulsant Medication Prior to Surgery/or Procedure Involving General Anesthesia

Children with seizure disorder face unique challenges during the perioperative period. Fasting, sleep-deprivation, and missed doses of medications while patients are required to have nothing per mouth (NPO) are a few factors that decrease the seizure threshold. The incidence of seizures in this population is unknown but correlated with patient's underlying condition and missed doses of anti-convulsant. Previous work has determined this is not a unique problem.

The investigators initially found compliance extremely poor at 60%. The investigators have made improvement to about 80% compliance through various interventions: education of nursing, availability of anticonvulsant intravenous dosing alternatives, and re-wording the hospital NPO policy. The investigators feel that a new, more focused, survey will help identify, perioperative reasons for non-compliance on part of the parents. This information will be utilized to guide further interventions aimed at improving compliance.