Epilepsy is the most common neurological disease  in dogs. During an epileptic seizure there is synchronized transmission of signals in many neurons in the brain. Seizures may lead to further damage to the brain, increasing the frequency of seizures and life-shortening affected individual. External symptoms of seizures are spasms and twitching of whole body. Epileptic seizures are divided into three basic types:

1. Primary generalized - attack comes on suddenly and affects the whole body, the dog immediately falls to the ground
   
2. Focal - spasms or twitching seen only in the parts of the body, for example in the face, dogs usually fall off, seizure can be very inconspicuous

1. Primary focal, secondarily generalized - begins as a focal seizure, after a while moves on the whole body  
   

Veterinary medicine recognizes several types of epilepsy:

• Symptomatic epilepsy
  

Epileptic seizures are a manifestations of brain disease, for example, a tumor, hydrocephalus or more.

• Reactive epilepsy
  

Seizures are a response to the violation of "balance" in the body - cased by liver disease or poisoning.

• Idiopathic epilepsy
  

If there was no direct cause of the epileptic seizures, reactive and symptomatic epilepsy has been excluded - the affected dog is diagnosed with idiopathic epilepsy which can be in most cases of hereditary origin. The first seizure usually occurs between 1 and 5 years of age, but can occur earlier or later.

Epilepsy is very difficult to control for affected border collie, many of them responds poorly to therapy (therapy has little or no effect).
 

Epilepsy is usually inherited in nature, which is why responsible breeders will eliminate all known carriers from their program. Dogs known to be epileptic or to have been the parent of a dog with epilepsy should no longer be used for breeding.

Database of known epileptic dogs