A NEURAL PATHWAY TO PEACE A Calgary Epilepsy Program project offers renewed hope for patients without treatment options. By Olivia Piché | Photograph by Jason Dziver Epilepsy affects approximately 30,000 Southern Albertans and about 30 per cent of those patients have drug-resistant cases. People with drug-resistant epilepsy can face severe disruptive seizures. Memory loss, physical injury, anxiety, developmental difficulties in children, limits to independence like driving or working, and even a higher risk of sudden death are all possible. That leaves these patients to seek out other treatment options, such as focal resection (removing the part of the brain responsible for the seizures) or neuromodulation (electrical stimulation that targets nervous system dysfunction). Unfortunately, factors such as where in the brain the seizures occur, age, and comorbid disorders, including depression, make some patients ineligible for these treatments. But thanks to a new project through the Calgary Epilepsy Program (CEP) at Foothills Medical Centre, Calgary is inching closer to a new transformative treatment. Led by Dr. Walter Hader, associate professor in the department of clinical neurosciences at the University of Calgary, and Dr. Fady Girgis, an associate professor of neurosurgery, the Responsive Neurostimulation (RNS) CEP project is an innovative five-year initiative that researches and offers a new type of neuromodulation. The project is a first of its kind in Western Canada. HOW RNS WORKS RNS uses a device implanted in the brain, directly where the seizures are happening. It responds to seizure activity, stimulating an electrical signal when activity is detected. This is different from approved neuromodulation treatments that deliver a continuous electrical current. RNS is a gamechanger for patients with treatment-resistant epilepsy and especially for patients whose seizures originate in areas of the brain critical to language, motor function, or vision where undergoing surgery is too risky.
Because of a patient’s individual response to the treatment, RNS can target only the impacted region, reducing the number of seizures. Outside of Canada, RNS has been shown to reduce seizures by an average of 70 per cent, and Hader and his team have already
Dr. Walter Hader
seen glimpses of this impact locally through their project.
A current Calgary Health Foundation fundraising priority, the RNS CEP project will implant 50 RNS devices plus its research team will follow the patients and gather data to inform future treatment guidelines. Since the initiative began in December 2025, Hader and his team have already successfully implanted more than 10 devices. SWIFT BENEFITS One of the RNS project’s first patients is a woman in her 20s, who was experiencing multiple intense seizures a day. She could rarely leave the house and used a wheelchair most of the time for fear of falling. Her world had become limited to the confines of her home. Within a few months of receiving the RNS device, however, her seizures dropped from around five a day to one every few days. This has made a tremendous difference to her quality of life. After years of not doing so, Hader says she’s now able to leave her house and do activities she loves, like swimming and golfing. “Seizures are a profound burden on a person’s life and their ability to have relationships, work, and pursue education,” he says. “When you reduce the number of seizures, patients can go back to school and work, enjoy favourite activities, and develop meaningful relationships.” Hader says Calgary Health Foundation has been an “innovation kickstarter” with the RNS program, but more support is needed to ensure ready availability of RNS devices to Albertans who have no other treatment options. “By proving that RNS works and reduces costs — and that patients want the treatment and
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have better outcomes — these are going to be huge selling points for RNS to be taken over by our public health system,” says Hader. “It’s about renewed hope.”
To support innovative projects like the
RNS CEP, scan the QR code or email fundraising@calgaryhealthfoundation.ca.
Breakthroughs [ Fall 2026 ]
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