EEG is an important test for diagnosing epilepsy because it records the electrical activity of the brain. It is safe and painless. Electrodes (small, metal, cup-shaped disks) are attached to your scalp and connected by wires to an electrical box.

The full EEG procedure usually takes 1 to 1.5 hours. During the process, electrodes are placed on your scalp. You may also be asked to do certain activities

An EEG is critical to evaluate people with seizures and there are many different types. Ambulatory, inpatient, and other types of EEGs have pros and cons

This section gives a brief introduction to how EEG electrodes are set up, what they mean and what the doctors can learn from reading an EEG.

When an EEG is done several hours or even days later, it misses the changes in electrical activity that occurred during the actual seizure. The likelihood of recording a seizure during a routine EEG is small. The EEG generally records brain waves between seizures, called interictal brain waves.

An ambulatory EEG may be done if you continue to have seizures after trying various seizure medications. The testing can either confirm the diagnosis of epilepsy or find that epilepsy waves are not causing the seizures. Ambulatory EEG monitoring is generally done …

If so, then doctors would call this a seizure related to epilepsy. Video EEG is helpful to: Determine if events with unusual features are actually epileptic seizures. Identify the type of seizures (like absence seizures) and their frequency ; Find the region of the brain where seizures begin.

What does it mean when an EEG shows spikes, sharp, or slow waves? First it’s important to realize that it may mean something very different for each person. Some waveforms or activity on an EEG are normal, while others may be within normal limits for some people but not others. Spikes or sharp waves are terms commonly seen in EEG reports.

The EEG is the principal test for confirming a diagnosis of seizures and gathering information about their type and location. It can be performed in a neurologist’s office but sometimes patients are sent to a hospital to have the EEG performed in the neurology or epilepsy department sometimes called an Epilepsy Monitoring Unit (EMU).

An EEG is a safe and painless test that looks for changes in your brain's electrical patterns that relate to seizures. Some abnormal patterns may occur with many different conditions, not just seizures.