 The ketogenic diet achieved national media exposure in the US in October 1994 , when NBC 's Dateline television programme reported the case of Charlie Abrahams , son of Hollywood producer Jim Abrahams . The two @-@ year @-@ old suffered from epilepsy that had remained uncontrolled by mainstream and alternative therapies . Abrahams discovered a reference to the ketogenic diet in an epilepsy guide for parents and brought Charlie to John Freeman at Johns Hopkins Hospital , which had continued to offer the therapy . Under the diet , Charlie 's epilepsy was rapidly controlled and his developmental progress resumed . This inspired Abrahams to create the Charlie Foundation to promote the diet and fund research . A multicentre prospective study began in 1994 , the results were presented to the American Epilepsy Society in 1996 and were published in 1998 . There followed an explosion of scientific interest in the diet . In 1997 , Abrahams produced a TV movie , ... First Do No Harm , starring Meryl Streep , in which a young boy 's intractable epilepsy is successfully treated by the ketogenic diet . 
