OBJECTIVES: To estimate and compare the prevalence of epilepsy during childhood using several approaches and also to determine whether school-based screening campaigns can capture epilepsy cases efficiently. METHODS: Epilepsy prevalence determined from cases captured through the Rashtriya Bal Swasthya Karyakram (RBSK), a nationwide school-health screening framework, were compared with estimates derived from school- and community-based surveys in one Indian district. Level-1 screen comprised perusal of child health registers maintained by the RBSK teams over one year to estimate the documented number of children with epilepsy
Level-2 screen comprised a questionnaire-based school survey among 10,000 school children
and Level-3 screen-a door-to-door community-based survey among 10,000 children in the district. RESULTS: Prevalence estimates of childhood epilepsy varied significantly across screening methods. The child health register identified lower crude and age-adjusted prevalences of 40 (95% CI, 24 to 55) and 36 (95% CI, 20 to 51)/1,00,000 vis-à-vis both the school survey [crude and age-adjusted prevalences of 354 (95% CI, 221 to 487) and 340 (95% CI, 181 to 517) per 100,000] and the community survey [crude and age-adjusted prevalences of 759 (95% CI, 591 to 927) and 746 (95% CI, 579 to 914) per 100,000]. The community survey identified 15 children with epilepsy (20%) who had dropped out of school. Also, it recaptured a small number of children previously identified by the school or child health register surveys. CONCLUSIONS: The present findings underscore the need to scale up the capacity of public programs to screen epilepsy among school children and underline the high frequency of school dropouts among children with epilepsy in resource-limited settings.