Orphan drugs in epilepsy

More than half of epilepsies start before the age of 20 years and nearly 25% of them are refractory.

A tiny proportion of them are even labelled a "rare illness", i.e. one affecting less than 200,000 people in the United States or less than 5 out of 10,000 people in the European Union.

For these patients, two problems in their management arise:

• In children, seizures affect an immature brain and can impact its development. It is therefore essential to treat them so that brain development continues as normally as possible.
• The rarity of these syndromes does not encourage the pharmaceutical industry to invest in research.

Therefore, there are few drugs available.

However, a few target syndromes with a particularly unfavourable diagnosis. This work outlines 6 molecules in detail that are specifically used in epileptic encephalopathies. Every aspect of these molecules is discussed, including drug development, indication, efficacy, cost, et