A Pub­lic Ser­vice Announce­ment (PSA) fea­tur­ing actor Greg Grun­berg and sev­eral of his celebrity friends was released nation­wide to ele­vate aware­ness about epilepsy and encour­age peo­ple to take action to reduce the impact of seizures. In addi­tion to Grun­berg, Jorge Gar­cia of Lost, James Den­ton of Des­per­ate House­wives, Kurt Fuller ofBet­ter with You, and Boris Kod­joe and Nicole Ari Parker ofSoul Food appear and urge all Amer­i­cans – whether or not they have epilepsy – to TALK ABOUT IT. The PSA was devel­oped through a part­ner­ship between TalkAboutIt.org, the Epilepsy Foun­da­tion and Lund­beck Inc.

When his old­est son Jake was diag­nosed with epilepsy at the age of 7, Grun­berg real­ized there was a neg­a­tive stigma and a lot of myths asso­ci­ated with epilepsy and peo­ple with the con­di­tion. He quickly learned that most peo­ple know very lit­tle about epilepsy, because most peo­ple just do not talk about it. Com­pelled to make a dif­fer­ence, Grun­berg col­lab­o­rated with the Epilepsy Foun­da­tion to cre­ate the web­site TalkAboutIt.org so that peo­ple affected by epilepsy – from par­ents of chil­dren with the con­di­tion to adults with seizure dis­or­ders – would never feel iso­lated or afraid again.

“I believe open dia­logue is the most impor­tant way to raise aware­ness and erase the stigma. My goal is to get every­one talk­ing about it. There are three mil­lion Amer­i­cans with epilepsy. You fac­tor in their fam­ily and their friends and that’s a lot of peo­ple who can make a pos­i­tive dif­fer­ence,” said Grun­berg. “Even if you don’t have epilepsy, you can still lend your voice to help.”

Another focus of the PSA is to encour­age those with epilepsy to see an epilep­tol­o­gist – a doc­tor who spe­cial­izes in epilepsy – and work together to man­age seizures. “When my son was diag­nosed, I thought that get­ting him to a few seizures a week was good enough, but even those impacted Jake,” said Grun­berg. “If you have epilepsy, please seek out an epilep­tol­o­gist, because even one seizure is too many.”

The PSA, which has been dis­trib­uted in both video and audio for­mats, will begin air­ing nation­wide in April and is also avail­able for view­ing on TalkAboutIt.org.

“It is an honor to part­ner with Greg and the Epilepsy Foun­da­tion to sup­port the Talk About It mis­sion,” said Beth Dean, Vice Pres­i­dent of Epilepsy at Lund­beck Inc. “Over the years, so many of us at Lund­beck have had the oppor­tu­nity to sup­port and attend hun­dreds of epilepsy walks and edu­ca­tional events. We are truly hum­bled to meet so many incred­i­ble peo­ple with epilepsy – as well as their sup­port net­works of epilep­tol­o­gists, fam­i­lies and friends – all part­ner­ing together for a bet­ter future.”

About TalkAboutIt.org

TalkAboutIt.org, cre­ated by Greg Grun­berg in col­lab­o­ra­tion with the Epilepsy Foun­da­tion, is an inde­pen­dently cre­ated web­site designed to end mis­per­cep­tions and mis­un­der­stand­ings about epilepsy. The site fea­tures celebri­ties of tele­vi­sion, film and music talk­ing about epilepsy aware­ness and proper seizure first aid. TalkAboutIt.org also hosts an online com­mu­nity where the pub­lic can post videos, pho­tos, sto­ries and make other cre­ative con­tri­bu­tions high­light­ing their par­tic­i­pa­tion in the ˜Talk About It’ Promise – to raise epilepsy aware­ness and end stigma in com­mu­ni­ties through­out Amer­ica and around the globe.

About Greg Grunberg

Greg Grun­berg, whose old­est son has seizures, is a vig­or­ous advo­cate for epilepsy aware­ness on the national stage and in the Los Ange­les area. Grun­berg has served as spokesper­son for the Epilepsy Foundation’s annual National Walk for Epilepsy in Wash­ing­ton, DC. He is also an active sup­porter of the Pedi­atric Epilepsy Project at UCLA and of Rush Uni­ver­sity Med­ical Cen­ter in Chicago. Grun­berg is best known for star­ring roles on tele­vi­sion series Felic­ity,Alias, and Heroes.

About the Epilepsy Foundation

The Epilepsy Foun­da­tion, a national non-profit with affil­i­ated orga­ni­za­tions through­out the United States, has led the fight against epilepsy since 1968. The Foundation’s goals are to ensure that peo­ple with seizures are able to par­tic­i­pate in all life expe­ri­ences; and to pre­vent, con­trol and cure epilepsy through ser­vices, edu­ca­tion, advo­cacy and research, so not another moment is lost to seizures. For addi­tional infor­ma­tion, please visit www.epilepsyfoundation.org.

About Lund­beck Inc.

Head­quar­tered in Deer­field, Illinois, Lundbeck Inc., a wholly-owned sub­sidiary of H. Lund­beck A/S in Den­mark, is ded­i­cated to pro­vid­ing inno­v­a­tive spe­cialty ther­a­pies that ful­fill unmet med­ical needs of peo­ple with cen­tral ner­vous sys­tem (CNS) dis­or­ders. With a spe­cial com­mit­ment to address­ing the needs of the epilepsy com­mu­nity, the com­pany focuses on ther­a­pies for some of the most com­plex seizure dis­or­ders while also actively sup­port­ing many community-based ini­tia­tives. For more infor­ma­tion, please visit www.lundbeckinc.com.

Con­tact: TalkAboutIt.org:
Alexan­dra Lip­pin, 310–965-1990
or
Lund­beck Inc.:
Matt Flesch, 847–282-1154

Source: PharmaLive.com