Woman Says Experimental Brain Implant Helped Her Lifelong Depression: ‘Continuous Prozac’

• A woman with lifelong depression says an experimental brain implant is helping her
• The device uses deep brain stimulation, or DBS, to electrically stimulate parts of the brain, similar to the way a pacemaker works in the heart
• She credits the device with saving her life, saying: “If I hadn’t had DBS, I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t be alive today.”

A woman with lifelong depression says an experimental brain implant – which provides electrical stimulation, similar to a pacemaker – saved her life.

Emily Hollenbeck is one of several hundred patients who received an experimental deep brain stimulation implant, and as she said Associated Press“If I hadn’t had DBS, I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t be alive today,”

“My family has a very long history with mental illness and depression in particular. My parents took their own lives, both of them, when I was 30 years old,” she told the newspaper, adding that she was 19 when her father died.

“That’s when I started experiencing symptoms, and the first major episode was when I was 21.”

Emily Hollenbeck, DBS (deep brain stimulation) implant patient for depression.

AP Photo/Mary Conlon

Depression is a mood disorder that can cause you to feel sad and lose interest, the Mayo Clinic explains. “It affects how you feel, think and behave and can lead to a variety of emotional and physical problems. You may have trouble carrying out normal daily activities, and at times you may feel as if life is not worth living.”

As the Mayo Clinic points out, depression is “more than just a bout of the blues…and you can’t just ‘snap’ out of it. Depression may require long-term treatment.”

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And for Hollenbeck, she says AP, “I tried every treatment. I tried drugs, with the highest doses.”

But it wasn’t until she underwent the implantation procedure that she saw a change, calling the device “continuous Prozac,” the brand name for fluoxetine, a common depression medication.

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“Very very simply, DBS..is a pacemaker for the brain,” said Dr. Brian Kopell, a neurosurgeon at Mount Sinai who has performed more than 2,000 DBS procedures.

DBS has been used to treat Parkinson’s disease, targeting the parts of the brain that control motor function according to the Parkinson’s Foundation – and as the National Library of Medicine says, “clinical trials have reported significant improvements in motor function and health-related quality of life” in patients with the progressive neurological disorder. .

The methodology of treating Parkinson’s disease and depression is the same, as Dr. Kopell said AP: “Depending on where you put the electrode, you can tap into different circuits in the brain.”

Brain scan.

Getty

For depression, electrodes are placed in the subcallosal cingulate cortex, which “modulates emotional behavior and is particularly involved in feelings of sadness,” explains the National Library of Medicine.

With scans from the device, doctors monitor patient movement, speech and diaries and use that data to determine a treatment plan.

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And for Hollenbeck, it works.

“Just being able to experience spontaneity, being able to look forward to things. Those things wouldn’t even be on my radar with depression,” she says AP.

“Now, I not only do these things, I look forward to them, plan them and enjoy them.”

The device’s maker, Abbott, received a “breakthrough device” designation from the Food and Drug Administration to investigate the potential for its use, and the AP notes that the agency could make a broader decision on DBS as a treatment for depression this year.

Categories: Trends
Source: HIS Education