- A recent study introduces a new, noninvasive means of using focused ultrasound to reduce the symptoms of Parkinson’s disease.
- The technique involves destroying a small neuron cluster to interrupt the neuronal network that produces uncontrolled movement and motor impairment.
- Compared to study participants receiving a sham treatment, twice the number of individuals receiving the new treatment experienced an improvement in their symptoms that lasted at least a year for many.
A new study presents a novel, noninvasive method for reducing involuntary movements, or dyskinesia, and motor impairment in people receiving treatment for Parkinson’s disease. The new method uses focused ultrasound.
At 3 months after undergoing the incisionless technique, twice as many people experienced an improvement in dyskinesia and motor impairment compared to study participants who received a sham, or placebo, treatment.
The improvements lasted up to 1 year in 77% of those who responded to the treatment.
People who undergo the focused ultrasound treatment can go home the same day.
The researchers reported infrequent adverse effects, including gait problems, speech difficulties, and visual disturbance. More serious adverse events occurred in the group that received the treatment than in the placebo group.
The study appears in The New England Journal of Medicine.
Parkinson’s disease is the result of low levels of the neurotransmitter dopamine in the brain’s
The leading theory is that there is a failure of autophagy, the brain’s housekeeping system, allowing an accumulation of debris that interferes with brain function.
“Dopamine synchronizes different areas of the brain so that they’re speaking to each other at the same frequency,” Dr. Jean-Philippe Langevin, director of the Restorative Neurosurgery and Deep Brain Stimulation Program at the Pacific Neuroscience Institute, who was not involved in the study, explained to…
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