@keeg1010

Hi Kerry,

First, I am so happy Keegan found the combi of med which works for him. From your sharing I guess it’s not unusual for an appointment to be scheduled once every 3 months. I would make my next appointment at the clinic after the end of each consultation. And yes, the follow up is often every 3 months. My official diagnosis is refractory multifocal epilepsy, and that’s ≈ 10 years ago. I’m currently dealing with daily seizures.

This country may boast to have some of the best medical facilities in the world. But we are still a small & young nation (≈6.5M & 60 years old). The patient pool will be small compared to bigger nations where cases are more diverse, thus neurologists there will be exposed to wider variety of cases and thus be more experienced when dealing with complex condition like epilepsy. The number of drugs they bring in is wider. I had never heard of Briviact before my first consultation in Taiwan. I brought this up with my current neurologist, and he said it’s worth a try. This drug isn’t readily available here; the local clinic had to indent it. Clinics and hospitals here tend stock the more “popular” drugs for every condition. In a larger nation, with a larger patient pool, the variety of drugs will naturally be wider.

I hate to leave the current neurologist who saved me when others weren’t optimistic about my chances. I was unconscious, almost dead. I still wonder if it’s a wise choice to start from scratch with another neurologist. I was honest with him about possibility of saying goodbye, and he’s ok.

The interesting part about treatment in Taiwan is the hospital combines traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) with western ones when so often the line is clearly drawn for treatments. TCM is an option I never considered before and overall treatment costs in Taiwan can potentially be cheaper and still be so even after factoring in the airfare & miscellaneous expenses. I can’t say treatment will be better since I haven’t started any substantial treatment yet. I communicate in Chinese and Mandarin with the staff at National Taiwan University Hospital (NTUH) where I visited. The international patient centre staff’s English proficiency seemed pretty decent so yeah, no worries if you decide to give it a try.

Do you mind sharing how much did each previous consultation approx cost? For me, my consultation was at a private hospital clinic so drugs I got (I believe get in future) weren’t generic ones. Those contain a MG or so more fillers and fewer active ingredients than what I will get from public hospitals (although cheaper of course). Without any scans, each consultation will cost USD100/consultation but drugs will be =USD900/month worth of drugs. 75mg of Topomax, 10mg of parampanel, 500mg of lamictal, 40mg of frisium, 240 mg of tebonin.

Cheers,
Louis