A Pacemaker For Your Brain

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A Pacemaker For Your Brain

• By
• Ryan Buckley

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What is a Pacemaker For The Brain?

• Similar to a heart pacemakers
• Implanted in chest
• Electrical stimulation to maintain rhythm in the
  heart
• Brain pacemakers
• Electrode permanently implanted in brain
• Used to maintain neural equilibrium
• Electric pulses

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Problems Being Solved

• Already proven to help treat/prevent certain
  diseases or ailments
• Parkinsons Disease
• Depression
• Epilepsy
• Anorexia
• The pacemaker effectively reorganizes the brains
  impulses

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How Are They Inserted?

• Neurosurgeon drills a dime-sized hole in skull
• An electrode is then inserted 4 inches into the
  brain
• A wire then runs under the skin to a battery
• The battery is implanted in the chest, either
  underneath the collarbone or even abdomen

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Methods

• Medical devices are surgically implanted into
  specific parts of the body
• Depending on the disorder, the location of the
  electrodes vary
• Non-Parkinsonian essential tremor thalamus
• Dystonia globus pallidus internus
• OCD Nucleus Accumbens
• A remote then controls the electric pulses sent
  by pacemaker

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Limitations

• Surgery
• Minimum of 5 hours
• Anything can happen
• Cost (30,000 - 50,000)
• Recovery time in patients
• Possibility that devices/wires may malfunction

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Future

• Smaller medical equipment
• Electrodes
• Pacemaker
• Cheaper cost of surgery
• More efficient ways to locate afflicted part of
  brain
• A permanent fix for brain electrical signals?

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References

• Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center.
  "First brain pacemaker implanted to treat
  Alzheimer's." ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 23
  January 2013. ltwww.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/
  01/130123164906.htmgt.
• Wikipedia Brain Pacemaker lthttp//en.wikipedia.or
  g/wiki/Brain_pacemakergt.
• Wikipedia Deep Brain Stimulation
  lthttp//en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_brain_stimulati
  ongt.
• Loyola University Health System. "'Brain
  pacemaker' effective for years against
  Parkinson's disease." ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily,
  20 June 2012. ltwww.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/
  06/120620162426.htmgt.
• Price, Michael. "SCIENCE W A TCH A Pacemaker for
  Y our Brain?" Http//www.apa.org. N.p., n.d. Web.
  
• News, CBC. "Brain 'pacemakers' Promising for
  Anorexia Treatment." CBCnews. CBC/Radio Canada,
  07 Mar. 2013. Web. 21 Sept. 2014.
• "Brain Pacemakers MIT Technology Review." MIT
  Technology Review. N.p., n.d. Web. 21 Sept. 2014.
• "First Brain Pacemaker Implanted to Treat
  Alzheimer's." ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, n.d.
  Web. 21 Sept. 2014.