Epilepsy – Latest Research Devices

Transcript

And then looking at an alternative treatments for epilepsy. And so, there are a few things that have sort of been been developing. So one was this neuropace device, which is relatively recently approved and we’re looking at new ways to use this. But the neuropace device is a device where if we know where the seizures coming from and we can’t remove that part of the brain or don’t want to remove that part of the brain, we can put this electrode on where that seizure is coming from, and it detects a seizure whether you’re aware of it or not and can stop the seizure in its tracks. And that has a potential utility in treating types of epilepsy that we couldn’t treat in any good way. And so an example would be someone who has seizures coming from both temporal lobes. We can’t remove both temporal lobes because that would give you lots of problems specifically with memory. But with the neuropace device, we can actually put those electrodes on the temporal lobes on both sides and it could be detecting where the seizures are coming from and stop them. Another device that sort of out there is a deep brain stimulator and which is something we use very frequently for Parkinson’s disease. This is a device where there’s actually an electrode that’s implanted into the brain, into a part of the brain called the Thalamus, which is a relay area of the brain. And there this, this device can actually electrically stimulate the brain itself causing reduction in seizure frequency. There’ve been some trials on this that have been promising, although hasn’t been approved yet and probably need some more studies down the line. You know, with respect to treatment, there are always new things sort of being evaluated and examined. And even beyond that sort of devices that we have being tweaked, like the vagal nerve stimulator, there are potential changes to the vagal nerve stimulator that might make it more effective down the line. Like an ability for the device itself to detect seizures on its own and Zap that vagus nerve on its own to help abbreviate a seizure so that a person doesn’t have to swipe it themselves. It just automatically goes. So there’s some exciting new things coming along the pikes and always new things kind of coming out there. We’re very excited about any and all new therapies to treat this disease.