Using technology to treat neurological disorders

One advent of modern technology is the improvement in treating previously untreatable diseases and disorders. Through the magic of neuromodulators, scientists are able to help stimulate the central nervous system of a person who a few years ago would have not hope of altering their medical predicaments.

One example is Parkinson’s disease, which makes the body convulse nearly continuously, making even everyday functions like walking and eating frustrating and painful for many people. Doctors have successfully implanted neuromodulators in a handful of patients, and the results have been startling: These patients are more able to do “normal” things, thanks to the technology.

Other scientists have applied neuromodulator technology to patients with chronic pain. Some neuromodulators installed in the spines of patients with debilitating chronic back pain has allowed those patients to walk again.

Dr. Todd Sitzman, an anesthesiologist in Hattiesburg, Miss., has, in the past several years, used neuromodulators in hundreds of patients who suffer chronic pain.
“Does it work from the patient’s perspective? Without question,” said Sitzman, who sits on the National Pain Foundation’s board of directors. “It is a therapy that gives them some relief and some semblance of a life.”

Neuromodulators are even being used to treat chronic depression, by stimulating certain nerves that make patients susceptible to depressing feelings and thought patterns.

Operations are expensive, of course, mainly because they are rare and because of the novelty of the technology.

“I can tell you eight years ago, neuromodulation was not on the tip of anybody’s tongue, but today it is reaching critical mass and it’s gaining momentum and people are starting to imagine what is possible,” said Chris Chavez, president of St. Jude Medical’s ANS division.

The Texas hospital is conducting a series of clinical tests on the value of neuromodulators, and the results so far have been encouraging, hospital officials say.