Tag: deep brain stimulation

History shows us that the mentally ill are extraordinarily vulnerable to therapeutic experimentation, some particularly brutal and extreme, which continues to the present day.

The basic assumptions behind unethical practices like lobotomies and insulin shock therapy are still the foundation on which psychiatry’s main treatments are built today.

In the Washington Post last week, a new treatment was being advanced as a breakthrough for opioid addiction. What was this miraculous new intervention? Implanting electrodes deep in the brain, and using a battery implanted elsewhere in the body to zap the addict and keep him from relapsing.

A new paper is touted as showing that deep brain stimulation "provides a robust antidepressant effect." Among the 28 patients in the study, 56 serious adverse events were reported, including infection, hemorrhage of the cortex and post-operative seizure. Yet the authors conclude that the results "support the long-term safety and sustained efficacy" of DBS.

In a new study, Baylor College of Medicine researchers have raised ethical questions about clinical trials of deep brain stimulation (DBS) and other brain implants. "'Generally,...

The published report of the Broaden Trial of Deep Brain Stimulation for Depression whitewashed the results: although the efficacy results were negative, the investigators concluded that the therapy still showed "promise", and adverse events suffered by the patients were downplayed or attributed to the disease, and not the treatment. An in-depth investigation of how the trial results were spun, and interviews with patients that tell of harm done.

A new paper published in Bioethics assesses proposals to “enhance morality” through neuropharmacological and neurotechnological interventions.

Questionable research practices and poor reproducibility in electrical brain stimulation (EBS) studies.

From Gizmodo: Some researchers believe that deep brain stimulation - a surgical procedure involving the implantation of electrodes that send electrical signals to specific areas...

In the PLOS Mind the Brain Blog, James Coyne reacts to an article and editorial in JAMA Psychiatry reporting effects of brain stimulation therapy...

Hundreds of people have been given remote control deep brain stimulation implants for psychiatric disorders such as depression, OCD and Tourette’s. Yet DBS specialists still have no clue about its mechanisms of action and research suggests its hefty health and safety risks far outweigh benefits.