Yes, they do.

I was a patient in Fine & Duff's  study.    My pallidotomy was seven years
ago.  I have had no dyskinesias for seven years.  I felt the rigidity leave
the left side of my body as my neurosurgeon made the lesions.  It has not
returned

Cheers,

Bill








----- Original Message -----
From: John Cottingham <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Friday, November 17, 2000 8:29 PM
Subject: Do Pallidotomies Really Last?


> Surgery can relieve Parkinson's symptoms for more than 5 years
>
>  Source can be found at:
> http://www.msnbc.com/news/417821.asp
>
> ASSOCIATED PRESS
>
> June 7 - Burning a tiny hole deep in the brain can relieve some symptoms
of
> Parkinson's disease for more than five years, a study found. But some
major
> improvements, including the ability to live unassisted, wear off.
>
>          STILL, the surgery can be useful when medicine alone cannot
control
> the progressive neurological disorder, doctors in Toronto concluded.
>        The surgery is called pallidotomy and involves the removal of a
part
> of the brain that controls movement.
>        The surgery is different from that undergone by actor Michael J.
Fox,
> the Parkinson's patient who left television last month to focus on finding
a
> cure. Fox had a thalamotomy, a decades-old operation that destroys
> overactive, tremor-causing nerve cells by burning or freezing a pea-size
> spot in the brain.
>        A study on pallidotomy was published in Thursday's New England
> Journal of Medicine. It is a follow-up to one published in 1997 about the
> first 40 patients the doctors treated with pallidotomy.
>        Doctors knew that, over the short term, pallidotomy can relieve
> symptoms such as tremors and stiffness, as well as uncontrollable arm and
> leg movements caused by the medicines used to treat Parkinson's disease.
>        The earlier study of 40 patients found significant improvement both
> while taking medications and off them.
>        The follow-up found that the reduction in tremors and rigidity
while
> off medication was nearly as marked 4½ years afterward as at the first
> checkup six months after the operation. So was the reduction in the
twitches
> and jerks caused by medicine.
>
>          But improvements in the level of daily functioning did not last.
> The study did not give details, except as composite scores in several
scales
> designed for Parkinson's patients.
>        In addition, only 20 of the patients could be included in the
> follow-up, and they were generally the ones who had responded best at the
> start, wrote Dr. Jennifer Fine, a neurosurgeon at Toronto Western
Hospital.
>        "This bias may limit the general applicability of our results,"
Fine
> wrote.
>
>        © 2000 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not
> be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
>
>
>
> [log in to unmask]
>
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> John Cottingham
>