Commission on Classification and Terminology

The classification of epilepsy is a changing and difficult process. The initative to produce an international, standard classification of seizures was taken by H. Gastaut, the Secretary General of the ILAE in the early 1960s. He produced a draft for comment by the American and European branches of the ILAE, the the World federation of Neurology and of the International Federation of Societies for Electroencephalography and Clinical Neurophysiology. Publication of the classification occurred in 1969/1970 and new discoveries are still being made about pathological processes in the brain. Subsequent work of the Commission serves to update, amend and improve the 1960s classification.