Track Seizures and What Comes Before Them

A seizure is an episode of shaking, stiffening, blank staring or lost awareness that you cannot control. Some are epileptic, caused by a burst of abnormal electrical activity in the brain. Others are functional (dissociative) seizures, a real and involuntary disorder of how the brain handles signals, with a normal EEG. Either way, the person having the seizure often remembers little of it, and neurologists rely heavily on what was written down. A dated log of each episode, its length, what happened before and how long recovery took is the most useful thing you can bring.

Why track this symptom?

  • Seizure frequency is the number your neurologist uses to judge whether a treatment is working.
  • Patterns with sleep loss, missed doses, alcohol, illness or your menstrual cycle only show up across months.
  • Written details of each episode help tell epileptic, functional and other events apart.

How Trace Health helps

Log a seizure in one tap as soon as you are able, or have someone you trust log it on your iPhone, rating it mild, moderate or severe and adding a note with the time, how long it lasted, what a witness saw and how you felt afterwards. Log sleep, stress, alcohol, daily medications, missed meals and your period on the same timeline, where you can see which of them line up with your seizures. The doctor-ready PDF report lists each episode with its dates and notes, so the conversation starts from facts. Trace is a diary, not a seizure detector or alarm: it does not alert anyone.

Common causes

Epilepsy is the most common cause of recurrent seizures. It may follow a stroke, head injury, brain infection, a tumor or a developmental difference, run in families, or have no cause found. In someone with epilepsy, the usual triggers are missed or late medication doses, sleep deprivation, alcohol (often the day after drinking), recreational drugs, fever or illness, intense stress and, in a minority, flickering light. Hormonal shifts around menstruation can cluster seizures (catamenial epilepsy). Seizures can also be provoked in anyone by low blood sugar, very low sodium or calcium, alcohol or benzodiazepine withdrawal, some medications and drug overdoses, or a high fever in young children. Functional (dissociative) seizures are a different condition: no epileptic discharge occurs, they are common in neurology clinics, and they often follow a build-up of stress, pain, fatigue or past trauma, though not always. Fainting can look like a seizure, with a few jerks, and must be told apart.

When to see a doctor

Call emergency services if a seizure lasts more than five minutes, if one seizure follows another without recovery in between, if the person does not start to wake up after the shaking stops, has trouble breathing, is injured, had the seizure in water, is pregnant or has diabetes, or if this is a first ever seizure. Do not put anything in their mouth; move hard objects away, cushion the head and turn them onto their side once the movements stop. Use rescue medication only as your care plan says. See a doctor promptly after any first seizure, and contact your neurologist if your seizures become more frequent, longer or different in kind, if you have new side effects from medication, or if you are planning a pregnancy. Ask about the driving rules where you live.

Frequently Asked Questions

What should I write down after a seizure?

Write down the date and time, how long it lasted (witnesses tend to overestimate, so a timed phone call or video helps), and what you were doing just before. Note any warning: a rising feeling in the stomach, déjà vu, a smell, tingling, or a sense of dread. Ask a witness what they saw: eyes open or closed, which side moved first, stiffening, jerking, chewing, fumbling, staring, color change, whether you responded. Add tongue bite, incontinence, injury, and how long it took to feel yourself again. In Trace Health a note sits on each entry, so all of this stays dated next to the severity rating.

Can tracking help tell epileptic seizures from functional seizures?

A log does not make the diagnosis, but it gives the specialist the right material. Epileptic seizures tend to be brief, under two or three minutes, stereotyped from one event to the next, often with eyes open, and they can arise from sleep. Functional seizures are more often longer, with eyes closed, movements that wax and wane or switch sides, and they often follow stress or a trigger situation. There is plenty of overlap and some people have both. The definitive test is usually video EEG, which captures an event on camera and EEG at once. A good diary and a witness video help decide who needs one.

What are the most common seizure triggers?

For people with epilepsy the classic triggers are missed medication, too little sleep, alcohol, illness with fever, and stress. Missed doses and sleep loss are the two that come up again and again in seizure diaries. Alcohol often acts the next morning rather than the same night. Some women notice clusters around their period or ovulation. Only a small share of people, mostly young, are sensitive to flashing or flickering light. Triggers are personal, so the useful exercise is to log sleep, medication, alcohol, stress, missed meals and your cycle every day, not only on seizure days, so the comparison is fair.

Should I log seizures that happen in my sleep?

Yes, and they deserve special attention. Night seizures are easily missed: clues include waking with a bitten tongue, a wet bed, sore muscles, blood on the pillow, a headache or confusion with no explanation, or a partner noticing noises or jerking. Log the clue even if nobody saw the event, and note what was found. Seizures from sleep are relevant to treatment choices and to safety planning, so make sure your neurologist knows how often they happen. Some people use a dedicated seizure detection device or a bed sensor for night events; Trace Health is a diary for recording them, not a detector or alarm.

How long should I keep a seizure diary before an appointment?

Keep it continuously if you can. Neurologists judge treatment by seizure frequency over months, so a three month record before a review is a good minimum, and longer is better for spotting cycle-related clusters or seasonal changes. If your seizures are rare, every single event matters, along with medication changes, missed doses and any side effects such as drowsiness, mood changes or dizziness. Trace Health keeps the history on your iPhone and exports a doctor-ready PDF for any date range, with each seizure, its notes and the activities you logged around it, so the appointment starts from evidence rather than memory.

Your health data stays on your iPhone.

No account. Private. No personal information is ever requested. Your health data stays on your iPhone by default. A backup option to your private iCloud is available. Trace Health never collects or sells your health data.

What people say

Rated 4.8 out of 5 from 62+ ratings on the App Store.

  • “Out of all the symptom tracker apps, I found this to be the easiest and most straightforward. It “writes” to the health app, which is exactly what I wanted. All the others only “read” parts of the health app data, and didn’t truly write any data back. This helps me visualize my chronic symptoms soooo well.” (EB1700, United States)
  • “I’m not really into tracking mood and habits but this app has shown me the benefit of doing so and has helped me reflect on my day to help find the positives and see where I can improve.” (GavinLanoe, United Kingdom)

Read the complete guide: How to Keep a Seizure Diary That Your Neurologist Can Use →