European Parkinson's patients receive first Libra DBS implants to help alleviate symptoms

St. Jude Medical's announced that patients from Austria, Germany, and Greece are among the first to be implanted with Libra Deep Brain Stimulation (DBS) devices to alleviate the symptoms of advanced Parkinson's Disease. Specifically, it's able to reduce akinesia, rigidity, tremor, and motor complications associated with taking levodopa.The company's touting Libra and LibraXP as having the longest-lasting battery of any DBS in their class, meaning potentially less surgical procedures needed for for when they gotta be replaced. No word on when they'll be expanding use of the device, but we're sure it's coming.

[Via Medgadget]

[Decoy Posted Apr 2nd 2009 4:34AM]

Inb4 Watchmen reference.

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 2nd 2009 5:37AM]

haha Dr. Manhattan

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 2nd 2009 10:53AM]

Old news in general. I guess it's new that Libra is making them now...

[Wwhat Posted Apr 2nd 2009 6:53AM]

Ah the good old symptoms suppression alternative to cures, still doing good.

[superhobo Posted Apr 2nd 2009 7:18AM]

Nice.

[AMcUK Posted Apr 2nd 2009 9:13AM]

Having worked on a haptic simulator for Parkinsons and attended several neurology congresses I can heartily applaud any effort to help with symptoms OR the underlying disease.
Anything must be better than diskinesia interspersed with near paralysis.
Patients I met had their brains cauterised which is destructive and non-reversable but a couple of years of more normal life was considered preferable to many.

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 2nd 2009 2:44PM]

Nice to see someone picking up the slack left behind when Amgen canceled their experimental drug for Parkinsons. It had a similar design though with tubes leading to the brain to deliver the drugs.

[Ksult1 Posted Apr 2nd 2009 9:03AM]

I remember deep brain stimulation being used back in the day when I was studying it. The results were much more promising than stem cell research. I hope this newer version lives up to their expectations.

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 2nd 2009 9:42AM]

@ AMc

Completely agreed!!


However one of the major problems with this approach it doesn't take into account the massively progressive nature of this disease (at least not autonomously). This is essentially the digital equivalent of medicine and the shelf life of treating a symptom isn't that great. The amount in which this device "controls" the symptoms has to be reprogrammed overtime. If this device were coupled with say a brain gate technology to monitor current symptom levels and actively adjusted then we'd have a winner. Alas i'm too busy and not smart enough to do it myself.

[Wwhat Posted Apr 2nd 2009 10:27AM]

To me only being able to suppress symptoms, somewhat, for a time, is just a sign of failure, no matter how much better it is to sufferers compared to having nothing.
Not that you can blame anybody (I hope), medical science just isn't that advanced really, it's mechanical fixes and a lot of stabbing in the dark and hoping, without knowing.

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 2nd 2009 11:01AM]

My mom has essentially the same thing. Every once in a while the voltage has to be tweeked to reduce symptoms, but of course this tweeking doesn't go without after effects. If this can reduce the effects of the voltage change (i.e. slurring of speach, so instead of shaking she sounds like a drunk verysion of the crazy cat lady from the simpsons), then that would be great. These are also used to reduce symptoms of people with terets (sp?) syndrome.

[Leicaman Posted Apr 2nd 2009 11:14AM]

Less ≠ fewer. Lern to writ!

[Borik Posted Apr 3rd 2009 12:40PM]

as long as there is no Libra Vista they should be fine

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 2nd 2009 2:46PM]

I wonder if they could use the Inductive Charging systems that are popping up all over like the Palm Pre charging stone.

This way you could recharge the battery through the skin and don't have to go in for surgery.

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 29th 2009 1:19PM]

i know you would have to havethe batteries of the unit changed every once in a while but does anyone know if you would have to have the electrodes changed at all?