With “electrical impulses” .. a new device to relieve symptoms of...

Doctors from the University of California, San Francisco, USA, performed a surgical operation, during which a device the size of a matchbox was implanted into the skull of a severely depressed patient, as the device began to search for nerve signals of mental illness.

Once these patterns were identified, the device, implanted more than a year ago, stimulated a different area of ​​the brain to relieve depression symptoms.

The patient searched for many treatments to get rid of her depression, over a period of 5 years, but all her attempts were unsuccessful.

For her part, the patient, named “Sara”, a 36-year-old young woman, said: “My daily life became so restricted due to depression that I felt tormented every day.”

Sarah, who asked to be known only by her first name, added, “This device had long-lasting effects, and before I had it, I was feeling dark around me. Now, I wake up and do my daily duties. For me, the device was a wonderful blessing.”

And she continued, “This is the first time in 5 years that I laugh or smile spontaneously without any fake.”

According to the procedure, the device uses a technique called deep brain stimulation (DBS). This approach has previously been shown to be effective in treating Parkinson’s disease and epilepsy, but success in treating depression has been limited, with the main drawback being that depression involves areas of Different types of brain differ between individuals.

Doctors overcame this obstacle by analyzing the interrelationships between the patient’s mood and brain activity, as they discovered the emergence of a certain pattern of neural activity when the patient became depressed. Then they modified the DBS to respond only when it recognized this activity. When this happens, the implant sends electrical impulses to the part of the brain that sends positive mood signals from the patient.

The doctors explained in their study that “this stimulation led to a rapid and lasting improvement in the treatment of depression.”

The team acknowledged that their method has proven effective in only one patient so far, but their study may be a defining moment in treating depression.

Study author Catherine Skangos, a psychiatrist at the San Francisco Neurosciences Institute at the University of California, San Francisco, said: “Through this experiment, we have identified some basic characteristics about the brain, and we also believe that these findings will be available to the general public, as they will help us develop New depression treatments.