Hello
Thank you for your letter, Barbara.
We are very excited about getting replies so fast.
As we read some of your previous correspondences, we wondered about the
expression Pallidotomy. We would appreciate, if some of you would be kind
to explain this phenomena. Thanks !
Regards
Danish students.
---- End Forwarded Message
Dear Students: Pallidotomy is a neurosurgical procedure in which a
lesion is created in the globus pallidus, an area of specialized
brain cells deep within the cerebral hemisphere, part of an area of
the brain called the basal ganglia. This area also includes other
structures, such as portions of the thalamus, substantia nigra (in the
brain stem) and other areas which play a role in the control of
the motor system of the brain. Cooper and others, in the 1950's and
1960's, found that the creation of lesions in some of these areas
causes changes in the abnormal movements produced in Parkinsonism and
other diseases of the motor system. These lesions (of which
pallidotomy is one form) are usually done by the insertion of a probe
into the brain, under x-ray control (called stereotactic surgery) and
the destruction of the cells is produced by a balloon (the first work),
freezing, radiation, or radiofrequency current. Pallidotomy (and
other forms of stereotactic surgery) lost favor as a treatment of
Parkinson's disease and related conditions with the development of
L-DOPA and other drug therapy; but there has been a re-awakening of
interest in surgery for Parkinsonism recently as we have discovered
that the beneficial effects of the drugs are only temporary. Surgery
for Parkinsonism, popular in the sixties, is presently not common; and
in any case, is felt to benefit the *motor* phenomena (tremor) most,
while helping the rigidity rarely, and usually not helping the other
manifestations of the disease.
I would recommend that you consult the neurosurgical literature,
starting with the work of Dr. Irving Cooper in the late fifties
and early 1960's.
Best of luck and welcome to this List.
Bob Fink (Berkeley, California)
