Did he have a seizure and then fall as a result, or did he fall and then have a seizure?

It depended on which network you were watching on Monday, and yet this simple detail could make a world of difference in uncovering the truth of what really happened to Chief Justice Roberts.

When the dazzling John Roberts wooed senators during his confirmation hearing, it was clear that his synapses fired smartly. But it seems few were told they could all fire at once.

The first news reports of Justice Roberts’ seizure gave new meaning to the phrase “media frenzy.” On CNN, speculation immediately turned to whether the chief justice of the United States could have a brain tumor. On FOX News, a medical commentator who was hastily reached by phone said a brain scan, of the sort he speculated Justice Roberts’ had, could easily miss a small tumor. Well, maybe, but I’m not sure I want to take medical advice from a doctor who can be reached by phone in the early afternoon. I mean, shouldn’t he be playing golf?

This sort of incomplete reporting lasted throughout the evening, and it left some nagging questions of vital national interest. For example, when the first reports surfaced that Justice Roberts had a seizure 14 years ago, the most maudlin speculation subsided, but one reporter rightly wondered whether the White House was aware of this piece of medical history.

What did the president know, and when did he know it?

Dogged reporters at CNN managed to reach Senator Specter, who was chairman of the Judiciary Committee when it considered Justice Roberts for the Supreme Court nomination back in 2005. Mr. Specter said that senators indeed had been aware of the earlier seizure, but did not think it was important enough to raise at the confirmation hearing.

That raised its own questions. Did the Republican-led Senate Committee skirt its oversight responsibilities, perhaps smitten by Justice Roberts’ dalliance with the furtive Federalist Society?

Even days later, a New York Times reporter was asking “important” questions about the deeper mystery, and hinting at an evolving cover-up.

“No matter what his doctors eventually tell John G. Roberts Jr., or the world, about the diagnosis and outlook for his seizure disorder it is clear that something changed irrevocably following the 52-year-old chief justice’s momentary loss of consciousness on a vacation island dock on Monday afternoon,” the writer opined.

Translated: If Justice Roberts was being straight with the American public, then were his hick doctors plucked from the backwaters of Maine playing it straight with Justice Roberts?

Because the seizure was his second — Justice Roberts had a similar one in 1993 — the chief justice meets the strict criteria for epilepsy. Justice Roberts and his doctors will have to decide whether he should take medication to prevent further seizures.

About 2.7 million people in America have epilepsy, roughly 1% of the population, and in 70% of the cases the cause is unknown. Seizures are often described to patients as an electrical storm in the brain, a brief episode of heightened brain activity that can cause mild symptoms, or result in lost consciousness and even full-blown convulsions, as happened in the case of Justice Roberts.

Most patients with epilepsy can manage their episodes safely with medicines that have minimal or virtually no side effects. The risk of having a single seizure in one’s lifetime is 9% and about 3% of people will go on to have a second seizure. Infantile seizures, often the result of high fevers, can be even more common than first-time seizures in adults, but most babies won’t have a second seizure, or remember their first.

Given the press accounts this week, it’s no wonder Supreme Court Justices have kept their medical histories closely guarded. Chief Justice Rehnquist once described reporters as vultures for their interest in his use of a prescription pain reliever.

Justice Marshall, hospitalized in 1987 for treatment of a blood clot, declined a reporter’s request to review his medical records. “I don’t think it’s anybody’s business,” he said. And Justice Blackmun didn’t discuss his recurrence of prostate cancer in the late 1980s, calling press inquiries about his health “reprehensible.” Justice Ginsburg was more forthcoming about her treatment for colon cancer while serving on the court.

Nobody knows the cholesterol level of Justice Alito, and who would trust it anyway after the Roberts’ affair? It’s still a good bet though that regardless of Justice Alito’s lipids, as the youngest Supreme, Justice Roberts still is among the healthiest. One hopes reporters get to the bottom of this soon.

Of course, the Supreme whose health garners the most interest is 87-year-old John Paul Stevens, whose reports of stumbling are followed closely by sunny courthouse reporters, some of whom openly wonder when his mental faculty will wane.

The good news for now is that as facts trickle out about Justice Roberts, all of the television doctors finally agreed that with modern care and medicines, the chief justice should be just fine. That’s a relief.

Dr. Gottlieb, practicing physician and resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, was a deputy commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration between 2005 and 2007 and was a senior official at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.