A plan to implant electrodes in the brain and treat psychosis and PTSD with electrical stimulation to clinical trials

byA Health Blog

A project like SF work is ongoing, like implanting an electrode in the brain and treating PTSD and mood disorders by sending electrical stimulation. America'sNational Defense Advanced Research Projects BureauAccording to DARPA, this project is entering the clinical trial stage and it is highly likely that it will establish itself as an effective treatment in practice.

AI-controlled brain implants for mood disorders tested in people: Nature News & amp; Comment
http://www.nature.com/news/ai-controlled-brain-implants-for-mood-disorders-tested-in-people-1.23031


In 2014, DARPA gives electrode stimulation with a very small chip embedded in the brainPost traumatic stress disorder(PTSD) and other such treatments.

DARPA launches "PTSD Implant Treatment Method" to Embed Minimal Tip in the Brain - GIGAZINE


It was held in Washington State, USA, which took place from Saturday, November 11, 2017Society for NeuroscienceIt was announced that this project entered the stage of clinical trial at the conference of.

As described aboveDeep brain stimulation therapyUsually,Parkinson's diseaseAlthough it is used in the treatment of the mood, it has been said that the research so far has no effect on mood disorders. Although the results show that it is possible to lighten chronic depression when a certain stimulus is given to a specific part of the brain, the depression patients of 90 who engaged in a certain research, even if treatment is carried out over a year, We did not see any improvement.

However, in the project at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) supported by DARPA, the implant was developed in a form specialized for the treatment of psychosis and designed so that the switch only enters when necessary It seems that it may succeed also in efforts that have been done. A closed-circuit brain implant developed by UCSF uses an algorithmMood disorderIt automatically detects the pattern associated with it and returns the brain to a healthy state by applying electrical stimulation.

UCSF neuroscientists Edward Chang et al. Implanted electrodes in the brains of six epileptic patients and observed brain activity and their mood for 1 to 3 weeks. From the information obtained here, researchers have created algorithms to decode patient mood by brain activity. It seems that we already tried clinical trials targeting one patient, but it was a "preliminary" experiment to the last, so details are not disclosed.

DARPA also supports other projects that ultimately aim at treatment of PTSD and soldiers suffering from depression and veterans who are going to Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH).

MGH's project does not detect people 's mood or psychosis like UCSF, but maps activities related to brain activities common to multiple mood disorders such as "difficult to concentrate and sympathy". Therefore, the implant algorithm is designed to stimulate when a patient fails to read other people 's emotions, or fails to match images or figures. As a result of previous experiments, it was said that patient's performance improvement was seen by sending electrical stimulation to the brain part related to decision making and emotion.

byMiguelángel Guédez

Some psychiatrists think that this approach of giving a closed circuit stimulation for a long time will produce better results than past therapies. The use of an algorithm to read the brain signal rather than the judgment of the doctor seems to be one of the reasons that these therapies are thought promising. However, concern is raised that treatment contents such as sending electrical stimulation to the brain may create ethical problems and excessive happiness feeling overwhelming other moods.