Alzheimer: deep brain stimulation

Alzheimer's damage reversed by deep brain stimulation

• 23 November 2011 by Jessica Hamzelou
• Magazine issue 2840. Subscribe and save
• 
  
• After deep brain stimulation near the formix,
  the hippocampus grew in two out of six people
  with Alzheimer's (Image: UBH Trust/STONE/Getty)

BRAIN shrinkage in people with Alzheimer's disease can be reversed in some cases - by jolting the degenerating tissue with electrical impulses. Moreover, doing so reduces the cognitive decline associated with the disease.

"In Alzheimer's disease it is known that the brain shrinks, particularly the hippocampus," says Andres Lozano at Toronto Western Hospital in Ontario, Canada. What's more, brain scans show that the temporal lobe, which contains the hippocampus, and another region called the posterior cingulate use less glucose than normal, suggesting they have shut down. Both regions play an important role in memory.

To try to reverse these degenerative effects, Lozano and his team turned todeep brain stimulation - sending electrical impulses to the brain via implanted electrodes./.../