Can a seizure or epilepsy cause permanent damage?

Can a seizure or epilepsy cause permanent damage?

Charles Ribak, Ph.D. (Professor of Anatomy and Neurobiology, UC Irvine School of Medicine) gives expert video advice on: What causes a seizure?; If I had a seizure, do I have epilepsy?; Are people with epilepsy more creative? and more...

A single epileptic seizure probably will not cause much brain damage. There are volumes being written on this topic. Scientists who are studying epilepsy want to know whether seizures cause brain damage. With certain types of seizures this has been documented. However, with other types of seizures, there appears not to be any brain damage, and we don't know the underlying basis for the seizures that occur in that type of epilepsy.