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Topic: tiny electrode under scalp zaps crippling headache (Read 430 times) |
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sweet_mystic
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tiny electrode under scalp zaps crippling headache
« on: Feb 26th, 2003, 8:09pm » |
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my husbands head shrink sent this to us,,
dr. sandeep amin is the doctor, without typing it all out , basically he hooked a tiny electrode to a needle and tunneled it under the skin of------------- by her left eye, stopping atop the nerve responsible for her pain , powered by a battery implanted by her colarbone, and a small wire runs the neck and into the scalp the device continually zapps the nerve with electrical pulses , blocking the illinois woman's pain, she goes on to say,,,,the minute he put it in, the pain was gone.....
It was in the Associated Press ,,, has anybody else read this????
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cootie
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Re: tiny electrode under scalp zaps crippling head
« Reply #1 on: Feb 26th, 2003, 11:58pm » |
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Kinda sounds like acupuncture with a 'twang'.......I have read of such treatments for pain impulses to other areas. Pam
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kissmyglass
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Re: tiny electrode under scalp zaps crippling head
« Reply #2 on: Feb 27th, 2003, 12:04am » |
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A friend sent it to me too.... Here is the entire article....
Kev C
Kevin,
The following is an article that was in our local newspaper Tuesday and in the Nashville Tennessean. I am pasting it in this letter. I hope it will be of help for your headache pain. They got the article from Associated Press. DNJ.com is the address for my local paper but I think you have to be a subscriber to read the full articles.
Nancy
Experimental implant under the scalp zaps away crippling headaches
WASHINGTON (AP) — Teresa Lamesch endured a constant, incapacitating headache for almost two years. The slight touch of wind blowing against her forehead caused shocking jolts of pain. Bright sunlight or loud noises could make her retch.
Heavy-duty narcotics and every other treatment failed to help.
Then Dr. Sandeep Amin tried a last-ditch experiment. He hooked a tiny electrode to a needle and tunneled it under the skin by Lamesch’s left eye, stopping atop the nerve responsible for her pain. Powered by a battery implanted near her collarbone, the device continually zaps that nerve with electric pulses — blocking the Illinois woman’s pain.
‘‘The minute he put it in, the pain was gone,’’ says a grateful Lamesch.
An estimated 20 million Americans suffer severe headaches, and as many as 10 percent of them have intractable head or facial pain. Treatment after treatment fails. Some are true migraines, which stem from inside the brain, but others — mistakenly called migraines — result from damaged nerves along the face or scalp.
Now a few doctors are exploring how well nerve stimulators implanted in different spots along the head could rid some of that crippling, nerve-caused pain.
People feel pain when nerve cells pass signals from one to another until the ‘‘I’m hurting’’ message reaches the brain.
Doctors have long implanted electrodes along the spinal cord to block certain kinds of pain from the neck down by interrupting those signals. But the stimulator had to be placed above the pain site — so blocking pain in the back, legs or arms was doable, but not in the head.
Then came the discovery that stimulating head and facial nerves at skin-deep levels, not just directly against the spinal cord, could work. First doctors targeted the occipital nerve to alleviate whiplash-like pain or back-of-the-head headaches.
Now they’re starting to target frontal headaches and facial pain, at the supraorbital nerve just above the eye.
It sounds logical, but ‘‘it really was surprising’’ to headache specialists that this new use of the implants seems to work well, said Dr. Robert Levy, a neurosurgeon at Northwestern Memorial Hospital who has implanted stimulators in the foreheads of four people so far. The first two he treated have reached the two-year mark pain free.
Nerve stimulation ‘‘has done wonders for this kind of a headache,’’ agrees Amin, an anesthesiologist and pain specialist at Chicago’s Rush-Presbyterian-St. Luke’s Medical Center, who implanted Lamesch and another patient who suffered unrelieved headaches after brain surgery.
It’s simple to implant. A battery lies under the skin by the collarbone, and a small wire runs up the neck and into the scalp. Two implants are needed if pain is on both sides of the head.
A magnet turns the electric current on or off. Turned off, pain resumes — but the implant is vulnerable to security devices like those in airports, and must be switched off until patients pass by.
Nerve stimulation for headaches is still highly experimental. But a handful of doctors have asked stimulator maker Medtronic Inc. to fund studies to prove how well it works for different kinds of head pain. Medtronic is considering a study, first, of occipital nerve pain.
A $5,000 to $10,000 implant sounds extreme for headaches. But these are extreme cases: ‘‘I see patients who are significantly debilitated, on dozens of medications, with overwhelming medical bills,’’ Levy says.
Levy and Amin doubt nerve stimulation would help true migraines. Instead, they hope to help people with the nerve-caused head or facial pain, whose options now range from narcotic painkillers — including implanted morphine pumps — to nerve-blocking injections into the spinal cord. Some even undergo attempts to surgically destroy the affected nerve.
Some, like Lamesch, fail all those options.
‘‘I had stopped living,’’ says the Wheaton, Ill., woman, who suffered pain in her legs and head after a tricky knee operation. A spinal cord stimulator stopped the leg pain so Amin finally adapted another one for her forehead. Now, she says, ‘‘I am bionic. ... I’m getting back on track.
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thraal
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Re: tiny electrode under scalp zaps crippling head
« Reply #3 on: Feb 27th, 2003, 3:00am » |
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fantastic news for that woman and people like her
doesn't sound like CH though...
i really hope they'll test it on CHs too though
t.
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totka
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Re: tiny electrode under scalp zaps crippling head
« Reply #5 on: Feb 27th, 2003, 7:21am » |
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... and it seems to me that's chronic paroxismal hemichrania. Or not.
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rumplestiltskin
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Re: tiny electrode under scalp zaps crippling head
« Reply #6 on: Feb 27th, 2003, 7:40am » |
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Research began in Italy. Some US Dr.s are trying it. Check archives. Meditronics is the leading Co. in implants.
It would beat headbanging.
Something works for everyone, nothing works for everyone.
Love
den
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jimash
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Re: tiny electrode under scalp zaps crippling head
« Reply #7 on: Mar 4th, 2003, 9:01pm » |
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New doctor called this thing a "nerve block".
I don't know.
I'd have to wear it forever and just turning off the top layer of pain ,
seems to be too superficial for the deep nerve impulses that seem to drive the CH.
Would I be some kind of like cyborg with this thing in me?
somehow this does not sound attractive or convienient ,
Jim
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