{"id":133112,"date":"2017-11-17T11:07:56","date_gmt":"2017-11-17T17:07:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/?p=133112"},"modified":"2017-11-20T07:59:26","modified_gmt":"2017-11-20T13:59:26","slug":"local-girl-family-and-friends-call-attention-to-epilepsy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/?p=133112","title":{"rendered":"Girl, family, and friends call attention to epilepsy"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Jamestown\u00a0 (CSi)\u00a0 November is National Epilepsy Awareness month, and on Friday\u2019s Wayne Byers Show on CSi Cable 2, we talked with a Jamestown girl, 10 year old Braelon Geerdes, who is bringing awareness to National Epilepsy Awareness Month after she was diagnosed with the neurological disorder.<\/p>\n

Braelon is a fourth-grader at St. John’s Academy, who was in a music class when she was 9-years old when the teacher noticed Braelon\u2019s \u00a0face twitching and eyes rolling back.<\/p>\n

Also on our show, Braelon\u2019s mom, Tara Geerdes said, following that seizure, Braelon was referred Sanford Children’s Hospital in Fargo, and a pediatric neurologist, where Braelon had a seizure while undergoing an electroencephalograph, helping \u00a0doctors localize the activity in the right side of her brain.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Braelon has since be placed on medication, which is helping to control the seizures, but not eliminate them, as she has fewer twitches or seizures and continues to live a normal life, but staying away from contact sports.\u00a0 She does however participate in other sports, with head protection, and is active in other ways, playing the guitar, and the piano, and she\u00a0 sings at public events.<\/p>\n

Braelon has had a brief and sometimes undetectable absence seizure, which Tara said is a less severe seizure, one of 41 types of seizures.\u00a0 Epilepsy can range in severity \u00a0from occasional seizures to over 200 a day.<\/p>\n

Also on our show, Braelon\u2019s Grandmother, Sharylin Geerdes a nurse at Ave Maria\u2019s Heritage Center in Jamestown, said she is looking to form a Jamestown area support group.<\/p>\n

The Epilepsy Foundation of Minnesota, is presently serving a portion of North Dakota, offering support to cover expenses with Epilepsy seizure detection devices such as a sleep mat, sleep pillows, and a smartwatch all alerting parents, or in some cases a teacher, of the presence of a seizure.<\/p>\n

Braelon said \u201cTeam Braelon,\u201d has been formed bringing awareness to Epilepsy in the community, which includes helping with fundraising bake sales, and other public appearances and participation.<\/p>\n

Braelon said the team consists of classmates, family, and friends.<\/p>\n

Sharylin said \u201cTeam Braelon,\u201d will be on hand at a bake sale fundraiser on Saturday November 25, 2017 at the Buffalo Mall.<\/p>\n

Also \u201cTeam Braelon\u201d will have a purple float in the Jamestown Dazzle Parade, with family and friends, the evening of November 24, through Downtown Jamestown.\u00a0 Purple being the color of epilepsy awareness.<\/p>\n

Braelon and others also hand out wrist bands, calling attention to #RiseAboveSeizures, and the website efmn.org<\/p>\n

Sharylin pointed out that from the Epilepsy Foundation of Minnesota, Fargo office, the Regional Coordinator, Janice Tweet, \u00a0has visited Braelon\u2019s school, \u00a0St. John’s Academy in Jamestown, to educate the school staff and students about epilepsy.<\/p>\n

Tara said as a result, St. John\u2019s Academy is now a \u201cSeizure Smart School.\u201d<\/p>\n

On Friday November 17th<\/sup> the University of Jamestown nursing students participated in an epilepsy awareness presentation.<\/p>\n

For more information or to arrange a presentation, or learn about starting an epilepsy support group, or make a donation, contact Sharylin Geerdes at 701-320-6441, or Tara Geerdes at 701-799-8922.<\/p>\n

Brochures are also available by contacting Sharylin.<\/p>\n

The Epilepsy Awareness group is sponsoring a Bake Sale at the vendor show at the Buffalo Mall on Saturday 11-24-17.\u00a0 Come see the little purple elves from Team Braelon at work.\u00a0 We would welcome and donations of baked items, cracker mixes or anything else you may want to donate for this cause.\u00a0 Cash donations are always welcome.\u00a0 All proceeds will go to the Epilepsy Foundation of Minnesota\/North Dakota and The Chelsea Hutchinson Foundation.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Jamestown\u00a0 (CSi)\u00a0 November is National Epilepsy Awareness month, and on Friday\u2019s Wayne Byers Show on CSi Cable 2, we talked with a Jamestown girl, 10 year old Braelon Geerdes, who is bringing awareness to National Epilepsy Awareness Month after she was diagnosed with the neurological disorder. Braelon is a fourth-grader […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":133121,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[25],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-133112","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133112","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=133112"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133112\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":133251,"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133112\/revisions\/133251"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/133121"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=133112"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=133112"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=133112"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}