>Return-Path: <[log in to unmask]>
>From: "P&B Fahr" <[log in to unmask]>
>To: "janet paterson" <[log in to unmask]>
>Subject: Re:      NEWS-STN-Cuban Neurosurgeons Report Success
>Date: Sun, 17 Oct 1999 06:20:02 -0500
>
>
>Why go for 60% improvement with cell destruction when
>you can get virtually 100 % improvement with DBS of the
>STN.  And stimulation can be changed in the future if
>necessary.
>
>Paul
>-----Original Message-----
>From: judith richards <[log in to unmask]>
>To: [log in to unmask]
><[log in to unmask]>
>Date: Saturday, October 16, 1999 8:37 AM
>Subject: NEWS-STN-Cuban Neurosurgeons Report Success
>
>
>ANA: Cuban Neurosurgeons Report Success In Treating
>Advanced Parkinson’s
>By Edward Susman - Special to DG News
>
>SEATTLE, WA -- October 14, 1999 -- Cuban neurosurgeons
>report success in
>treating advanced Parkinson’s disease patients by
>destroying the
>subthalamic nucleus (STN) deep within the brain.
>
>    The bilateral lesioning of the STN gives better than
>a 60 percent
>improvement in Parkinson’s disease hallmarks such as
>motor control and
>freezing of motion, said Dr. Lazaro Alvarez Gonzalez,
>MD, a neurologist
>who has performed the surgery on 11 patients.
>
>    The patients first underwent unilateral lesion of
>the STN. When that
>seemed to control motor function on one side of the
>body, a second
>operation was performed about six months later.
>
>    Now, Dr. Alvarez said, both STNs are lesioned during
>the same
>operation - a procedure that has been performed a half
>dozen times. He
>said that by performing the bilateral ablation patients
>are spared a
>second operation and hospital costs are reduced.
>
>    Patients have been followed for up to two years, and
>the improvement
>has been sustained, Dr. Alvarez and his colleagues
>reported at the 124th
>annual meeting of the American Neurological Association,
>in Seattle, WA.
>    "STN requires less extensive surgery than
>pallidotomy or deep brain
>stimulation," Dr. Alvarez said. "DBS also requires
>pacemaker-like
>devices which is not needed in STN, reducing costs." He
>said that in
>non-Western economies cost-containment is a major issue
>and one of the
>reasons he and his colleagues at the Clinic for Movement
>Disorders
>(CIREN) in Havana began looking at STN ablation.
>
>    "Hyperactivity of the subthalamic nucleus (STN) is a
>hallmark of the
>Parkinsonian state," Alvarez said, and that
>hyperactivity can be
>observed with CT-scanning of the brain. Once the site is
>located, a
>needle probe is inserted into the STN. Radio frequency
>heats the needle
>and about a 4 cubic millimeter lesion erases the STN,
>said Dr. Raul
>Macias, neurophysiologist and assistant professor oat
>CIREN.
>
>    The researchers are working in conjunction with
>doctors at Emory
>University and in Spain.
>
>All contents Copyright (c) 1999 P\S\L Consulting Group
>Inc. All rights
>reserved.
>Judith Richards, London, Ontario, Canada
>[log in to unmask]
>                          ^^^^
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>Cure
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>