Toothman Family Expenses During Brain Surgery

John Toothman has had seizures for almost as long as he can remember. As a child and teen, he had frequent focal seizures. In his early 20s, his seizures developed into unconscious and convulsive seizures (Tonic Clonic). It was then he was officially diagnosed with epilepsy and has been on anti-seizure meds ever since.

He currently is averaging two Tonic Clonic seizures a month despite being on four different types of daily anti-seizure meds. John's seizures are particularly violent and life-threatening and often require ER visits. Due to John’s type of seizures, he is also at a greater risk for SUDEP (Sudden Unexpected Death in Epilepsy).

Unfortunately, John was recently diagnosed with Intractable Epilepsy, which is a type of epilepsy that is resistant to medication. John cycles through medications several times a year and ends up “failing” them each time.

The chances of John being seizure-free just from using anti-seizure medication is now less than 1%.

John’s team of doctors indicated that his best chance of being seizure-free or at least reducing seizure frequency is brain surgery. But, before his doctors can confirm what type of surgery is the best option for John (if any), they must perform another surgery first. John will be having a pre-op brain CT and brain MRI on January 3rd and then Bilateral Stereo EEG Implantation Surgery on January 18th.

During the implantation surgery, electrodes will be placed directly in the brain in order to help identify where epileptic seizures start. After surgery, John will be moved to the hospital’s Epilepsy Monitoring Unit. On average, patients stay 2-4 weeks.

While admitted, John will temporarily stop taking his anti-seizure medications. This is done to trigger seizure activity for the EEG to capture. When the source of the seizure is found, another brain surgery may be an option to help get seizures under control. The ultimate goal of this potential second brain surgery is to make John seizure-free. If that is not an option for John, the goal would then be to at least reduce seizure frequency and intensity.

John will not be able to work for over a month or more during his recovery process. Their household will be down to one fixed income while his wife Ashley has to limit her work outside of the home to stay with John and their preschooler full-time during this process.

Any financial contribution is greatly appreciated and will help make this journey a little bit easier for John and his family. GoFundMe payments will go towards rent, utilities, daily living costs such as groceries/gas/etc. as well as medical costs.