Could the solution to your child's epilepsy be a diet loaded with butter, cream, oils, and mayo? It might sound weird -- and maybe not so appetizing -- but the ketogenic diet is real. And in many kids, it works. But the super high-fat, super low-carb ketogenic diet is not for everyone. It's strict and complicated. And it's not really "healthy" in the normal sense. If you're considering it, you need to think through how it affects your child's life -- and the impact on the whole family.

Who Should Think About Trying the Ketogenic Diet? The ketogenic diet has been curbing seizures since it was first developed in the 1920s. About half of kids who follow it have a big drop in how many they get. As many as 1 in 7 stop having seizures completely. The diet helps with many types of epilepsy, but works especially well with Lennox-Gastaut syndrome, myoclonic astatic epilepsy (Doose syndrome), and others. Some pediatric epilepsy syndromes respond very well to the ketogenic diet and most adult epilepsies do not. Because the ketogenic diet is so demanding, doctors usually only recommend it if a child has already tried two or three medications and they haven't worked. When the diet works, kids can often lower their medication doses or stop taking them. What's more, most kids who stay on the ketogenic diet for at least 2 years have a good chance of becoming seizure free -- even after they go back to eating normally.