In this special episode coming live from the Association of British Neurologists (ABN) annual meeting in Birmingham, Practical Neurology co-editors Phil Smith and Geraint Fuller join hosts Ruth Wood and Babak Soleimani to discuss the perennial clinical and educational value of case reports in which, in a rare event, the patients are actually referred to directly by their first names.

The team discusses two compelling, patient-centered narratives.

They look at a complex case of refractory focal epilepsy from 2024 where the patient actively partnered in the high-stakes decision to balance seizure freedom against a predicted post-surgical motor deficit.

A review of a poignant "Me and My Neurological Illness" piece written in 2016 by a prominent epileptologist is a reflection on his subtle subacute presentation of autoimmune encephalitis, how a doctor's baseline cognitive reserve can mask complex focal seizures, and the unique clinical and personal challenges faced when dealing with medical colleagues who lack diagnostic insight into their own condition.

Archive papers discussed in this episode:

Case Report 1: Complicated epilepsy surgery: importance of balancing benefit and deficit.

https://pn.bmj.com/content/24/5/393

Case Report 2: Me and my neurological illness. Autoimmune limbic encephalitis due to VGKC-Ab. Thanks for the memory. Leo Robin (Title of song, 1937).

https://pn.bmj.com/content/16/2/162

Read the full papers on Practical Neurology.

Please subscribe to the Practical Neurology podcast on your favourite platform to get the latest episodes. If you enjoy our podcast, you can leave us a review or a comment on Apple Podcasts (https://apple.co/3vVPClm) or Spotify (https://spoti.fi/4baxjsQ). We'd love to hear your feedback on social media - @PracticalNeurol.

Production and editing by Brian O'Toole, Letícia Amorim and Pritesh Kapadia. Thank you for listening.

What's the real difference between a night owl and a morning lark?

The Editors' Choice paper for the June 2026 issue of Practical Neurology is a review of all the ways sleep intersects with neurological practice. Last author Prof. Guy Leschziner¹ joins PN podcast editor Dr. Amy Ross Russell to the wide variety of sleep-related disorders: insomnia, hypersomnolence, and sleep-related movement disorders. Each category contains pitfalls to be avoided when treating, like overlooking critical signs or reaching for drugs too eagerly. You'll also learn about "sleep reactivity", teenage sleep patterns in the animal kingdom, and diagnostic insight that can be gained from partners.

Sleep neurology: pearls and pitfalls

1. Sleep Disorders Centre, Guy's and St Thomas’ Hospitals NHS Trust, London, England, UK

Please subscribe to the Practical Neurology podcast on your favourite platform to get the latest episodes. If you enjoy our podcast, you can leave us a review or a comment on Apple Podcasts (https://apple.co/3vVPClm) or Spotify (https://spoti.fi/4baxjsQ). We'd love to hear your feedback on social media - @PracticalNeurol.

This episode was hosted by PN's podcast editor Dr. Amy Ross Russell. Production by Amy Ross Russell and Brian O'Toole. Editing by Brian O'Toole. Thank you for listening.

The latest highlights from the journal are set to give confidence when trying something new. In this podcast for the June 2026 issue of Practical Neurology, co-editors Phil Smith and Geraint Fuller bring a distillation of the wisdom found in the journal's pages. They explain the crucial role of a Zeitgeber for healthy sleep cycles, question the involvement of drugs like SSRIs in seizures, and share a transatlantic follow-up to the ABN myasthenia gravis guidelines which provides an approach to optimising over all patient well-being. There's also a guide to recent treatment of Parkinson's using foslevodopa-foscarbidopa infusion, also known as Produodopa. Then the editors explore the structure of the retina while touching on optic neuritis, and finish with limb-shaking transient ischaemic attacks, an early warning signal for stroke. Listen to the very end for some editorial insight into practical uses for the podcast itself!

Read the issue: https://pn.bmj.com/content/26/3/205

Please subscribe to the Practical Neurology podcast on your favourite platform to get the latest podcast every month. If you enjoy our podcast, you can leave us a review or a comment on Apple Podcasts (https://apple.co/3vVPClm) or Spotify (https://spoti.fi/4baxjsQ). We'd love to hear your feedback on social media - @PracticalNeurol.

Production and editing by Brian O'Toole. Thank you for listening.