Good news!
"Two patients with spinal injuries have seen improvements in their ability to walk again, thanks to deep brain stimulation (DBS). Intriguingly, the therapy targets a region of the brain that normally isn’t associated with motor skills. ...
Now, DBS has been used to help two people with partial paralysis regain mobility in their legs. Researchers at EPFL and Lausanne University Hospital surgically implanted electrodes into the lateral hypothalamus (LH) region of their brains, while the patients were fully awake. ...
Patients showed immediate improvement to their mobility when the deep brain stimulation was switched on during rehabilitation. Patients could walk and even climb stairs with less aid than usual. Importantly, those improvements persisted even after the stimulation was switched off. ..."
"In the study published in Nature Medicine, not only did the DBS show immediate results to augment walking during rehabilitation, but patients also showed long-term improvement that persisted even when the stimulation was turned off. These findings suggest that the treatment promoted a reorganization of residual nerve fibers that contribute to sustained neurological improvements. ..."
From the abstract:
"A spinal cord injury (SCI) disrupts the neuronal projections from the brain to the region of the spinal cord that produces walking, leading to various degrees of paralysis. Here, we aimed to identify brain regions that steer the recovery of walking after incomplete SCI and that could be targeted to augment this recovery. To uncover these regions, we constructed a space–time brain-wide atlas of transcriptionally active and spinal cord-projecting neurons underlying the recovery of walking after incomplete SCI. Unexpectedly, interrogation of this atlas nominated the lateral hypothalamus (LH). We demonstrate that glutamatergic neurons located in the LH (LHVglut2) contribute to the recovery of walking after incomplete SCI and that augmenting their activity improves walking. We translated this discovery into a deep brain stimulation therapy of the LH (DBSLH) that immediately augmented walking in mice and rats with SCI and durably increased recovery through the reorganization of residual lumbar-terminating projections from brainstem neurons. A pilot clinical study showed that DBSLH immediately improved walking in two participants with incomplete SCI and, in conjunction with rehabilitation, mediated functional recovery that persisted when DBSLH was turned off. There were no serious adverse events related to DBSLH. These results highlight the potential of targeting specific brain regions to maximize the engagement of spinal cord-projecting neurons in the recovery of neurological functions after SCI. Further trials must establish the safety and efficacy profile of DBSLH, including potential changes in body weight, psychological status, hormonal profiles and autonomic functions."
Stimulating hypothalamus restores walking in paralyzed patients (original news release)
A patient with a partial spinal cord injury walks with the help of Deep Brain Stimulation
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