Alzheimer's: Deep brain stimulation 'reverses' disease (BBC)

[eppur_se_muova]

By James Gallagher
Health reporter, BBC News

Scientists in Canada have raised a tantalising prospect - reversing Alzheimer's disease.

Brain shrinkage, declining function and memory loss had been thought to be irreversible.

They used a technique known as deep brain stimulation - applying electricity directly to regions of the brain. In two patients, the brain's memory hub reversed its expected decline and actually grew.

Deep brain stimulation has been used in tens of thousands of patients with Parkinson's as well as having an emerging role in Tourette's Syndrome and depression.

Yet precisely how it works is still unknown.
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more: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-15890749




:wow::wow::wow:

Hope this is *widely* reproducible! :fingerscrossed:

[DURHAM D]

1. Fingers crossed here as well.

Thanks for posting.

[aquart]

2. Oooooh.

Amazingly cool.

[Buddyblazon]

3. My stepmother Parkinsons, has the implants...

and has been undergoing deep brain stimulation for about five years (she insisted on them putting it on the tv in front of her during the brain surgery...SO SHE COULD WATCH!). It almost immediately took her condition back to where it was about 6 or 7 years earlier. But it hasn't permanently improved her situation. It was like gaining back half a decade. But the disease has continued to progress from that point.

She told me at Thanksgiving that the 20 year anniversary of her diagnosis is coming up in December.