Deep Brain Stimulation: A New Treatment Shows Promise in the Most Difficult Cases

Front Cover
Dana Press, 2009 - Medical - 176 pages

There are disorders that defy treatment with prescribed pharmaceuticals: a man's hands shake so hard that he cannot hold anything; a woman is mired in severe inescapable depression. For these patients and others, an alternative is emerging: deep brain stimulation. In this fascinating and timely investigation, well-known science writer Jamie Talan explains a cutting-edge medical development that is surprising and impressing researchers around the world.

More than 40,000 people worldwide have undergone deep brain stimulation, which involves implanting electrodes in the brain that are connected to a device similar to a pacemaker. With compelling profiles of patients and an introduction to doctors and scientists who are pioneering the research, Talan describes the ways in which deep brain stimulation has produced promising results in the treatment of diseases such as Parkinson's disease, depression, obsessive-compulsive disorder, and dystonia--as well as the ethical issues that have arisen in the course of this research.

From inside the book

 

Contents

Prologue
1
Chapter
7
Chapter 4
39
Copyright

9 other sections not shown

Common terms and phrases

abnormal activity Alterman Bakay basal ganglia battery began behavior Benabid benefit Blackman body brain regions brain scans Bruggeman called cells Center Cleveland Clinic cognitive colleagues consciousness Cooper cortex DBS patients DBS surgery DBS teams deep brain stimulation DeLong depression developed device doctors drug dystonia electrical electrodes epilepsy ethical Florida frequency functional globus pallidus Greenberg Grotta hospital implanted electrodes internal capsule L-dopa lead lesion Mayberg medicine Medtronic memory minimally conscious monkeys months mood motor move movement disorders MPTP networks neurologist neurology neurons neuroscience neurosurgeon obsessive-compulsive disorder Okun operating room pain pallidotomy Parkinson's disease Parkinson's patients Penfield percent persistent vegetative Plum problems procedure programming psychiatric psychiatrist Rasmussen reported Rezai Schiff scientists seizures side effects stereotactic stimulating electrodes subthalamic nucleus surgeons surgical symptoms Tagliati target technique thalamus therapy tics tion tissue took Tourette syndrome treatment tremor turned University Vitek wanted

About the author (2009)

Science writer Jamie Talan shared the 1998 Edgar Award with Richard Firstman for best nonfiction for The Death of Innocents, a story of forensic science that was also a New York Times Notable Book of the Year. Talan covered neuroscience for Newsday for more than twenty years and is currently science writer-in-residence at The Feinstein Institute for Medical Research in New York.

Bibliographic information

TitleDeep Brain Stimulation: A New Treatment Shows Promise in the Most Difficult Cases
AuthorJamie Talan
Editionillustrated
PublisherDana Press, 2009
Original fromIndiana University
Digitized10 May 2011
ISBN193259437X, 9781932594379
Length176 pages
Subjects ›  › 

Medical / Neurology
Medical / Neuroscience
Science / Life Sciences / Biology
Science / Life Sciences / Neuroscience
  
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