data collected on epilepsy patients from 211 GPs in England and Wales from the General Practice Research Database (GPRD), for the period 1994 to 1998. The age/gender prevalence rate of epilepsy in England and Wales suggested by Purcell et al. was then applied to the local population and estimations were made of the local prevalence of epilepsy.
11.4.1. Epilepsy by age Table 11.1 shows epilepsy prevalence rate (per 1,000 patients) by gender and age group in England and Wales in the year 1994 and 1998 (Purcell et al. 2002). It shows that: •
Epilepsy prevalence rate was positively associated with age. Higher prevalence was seen in older people
•
The overall prevalence for males and females were similar. However, males tended to have higher prevalence than females in older age groups, in particular, the 75 and above age groups
Compared with the QOF Prevalence rate for England (approx 6 per 1,000) during the period 2004/05 to 2007/08 (as illustrated in Figure 11.1), the Purcell et al.’s study (Purcell et al. 2002) (Table 11.1) suggests higher prevalence rate of epilepsy nationally at approximately 7.1 and 7.7 in 1994 and 1998 accordingly. This seems to suggest a decline in epilepsy nationally, however, as the data were collected from different sources, and the geographical area used was different (i.e. QOF did not include Wales), the difference might be caused by the difference in data collection and data quality. Table 11.1 Epilepsy prevalence rate (per 1,000 patients) by gender and age group, England and Wales, 1994 and 1998 (Purcells et al. 2002)
0-4
5-15
1624
2534
3544
4554
5564
6574
7584
85 and over
all ages
Males 1994
2.1
4.2
6.3
7.2
7.2
7.7
9.0
10.9
13.5
16.2
7.2
1998
1.9
4.4
6.6
7.9
8.0
8.4
9.5
10.9
13.9
15.1
7.7
1994
1.3
4.0
6.8
7.4
7.1
8.3
9.0
8.9
9.2
10.5
7.1
1998
1.8
4.1
6.9
7.9
7.8
8.7
9.0
10.2
9.9
11.0
7.6
Females
11.4.2. Epilepsy by gender Figure 11.4 shows age standardised treated epilepsy prevalence rate (per 1,000 patients) by gender in England and Wales, in 1994 and 1998 (Purcell et al. 2002) It shows that epilepsy prevalence rates for males and females were very similar, only
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