Neuroscientists have developed a new treatment for drug-resistant depression, which has shown incredible results. We are talking about intense magnetic stimulation, aimed precisely at the desired area of the brain.
The achievement is described in a scientific article published in the American Journal of Psychiatry.
The study showed that patients with depression have an overactive subgenual cingulate gyrus. Normally, it is controlled by the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (duodenum), but in chronic depression it clearly cannot cope.
The idea of the treatment is to stimulate the duodenum with magnetic fields through the skull. A similar method of dealing with depression has already been approved for use in the United States, but its effectiveness is not very impressive. Only about half of the patients experience improvement immediately after treatment, and only about a third achieve sustained remission.
A group from Stanford University has modified this treatment protocol in an effort to achieve better results.
The standard course assumes 600 magnetic pulses per session. Sessions are held once a day for six weeks. Coils are applied to the patient’s head in the place where the duodenum is located. Small individual differences between people in her position are not taken into account.
The new therapy differs from the usual in all three respects. First, the patient receives three times as many magnetic pulses per session. Although these doses have never been used to combat depression, they are used in the treatment of Parkinson’s disease and other neurological disorders. Therefore, previously such an effect can be considered safe.
Secondly, volunteers received 10 sessions per day lasting 10 minutes, with interruptions of 50 minutes. The treatment lasted five days.
Finally, magnetic pulses were aimed more accurately. Using MRI, the researchers determined the location of a specific section of the duodenum, which controls the subgenual cingulate gyrus, in each of the patients, and the effect was directed there.
Experimental therapy brought Deirdre Lehman back to the joy of life.
The study involved 21 patients. All of them at the time of the start of the tests were in severe depression, against which medicines, electroconvulsive therapy and conventional treatment with magnetic stimulation were powerless. In particular, all volunteers reported suicidal thoughts prior to the start of the study.
The results of therapy exceeded all expectations. 19 out of 21 participants (i.e. 90% of all patients) got rid of the symptoms of depression during treatment, and all 21 thought of suicide.
Tests for cognitive abilities (attention, thinking, memory, and so on) did not reveal any negative effects of therapy. On the contrary, the cognitive abilities of patients improved (as, however, usually happens when recovering from depression). The only side effect detected was a feeling of fatigue and some discomfort during the experiment.
One month after treatment, 60% of the subjects were still in a normal emotional state. This is a very good result for fighting drug-resistant depression. The “gold standard” here is electroconvulsive therapy, but it can achieve remission only in 48% of cases.
Specialists continue to monitor patients to find out how long-term the effect will be.
“I used to cry because of the smallest trifle,” said Deirdre Lehman, a 60-year-old study participant who has been struggling with bipolar disorder since she was 16 and spent almost two years in a severe depression before participating in the experiment. “But now, when “something bad happens, I just do not lose heart and remain calm. I am in a much more stable state and can enjoy the positive aspects of life thanks to the energy that allows us to achieve the goal.”
However, opening the champagne is not the time. The sample of 21 people is very small. This means that an amazing result can still turn out to be a random statistical deviation. In addition, the study was not placebo-controlled, so at least in part, the result can be explained by a high degree of self-hypnosis of patients. True, if self-hypnosis helped to achieve remission in 60% of cases of drug-resistant depression, the lives of patients with this disorder would be much simpler.
The authors plan to test their method on a large sample of volunteers using the double-blind method. In addition, they are going to check whether such stimulation will help people with obsessive-compulsive disorder, addiction and autism spectrum disorders.
By the way, earlier “News. Science” (nauka.vesti.ru) wrote about how magnetic brain stimulation can relieve a person of symptoms of schizophrenia and fear of heights.
–
