Search

Background: Deep brain stimulation (DBS) is a safe and effective treatment for patients with advanced Parkinson's disease (PD) and many neurosurgical centers in Italy have a DBS program. Considering the prevalence of PD and criteria for DBS implantation, about 3200-10,350 PD patients may benefit from DBS in Italy. The global management of patients underwent DBS is complex and it can be supposed that many differences exist between centers in clinical practice. The Italian Neurosurgery Society (SINch) designed this survey to investigate the state of the art of DBS for PD in Italy., Methods: A 26-item closed-ended question survey was designed and sanded by email at all Italian Neurosurgery centers. The main topic investigated was DBS teams, anatomical target selection, surgical procedure, neuroimaging, intraoperative target localization, DBS device and patients' follow-up., Results: A total of 23 neurosurgery centers completed the survey. There are mainly low-to medium-volume centers (<20 annual DBS procedures) with dedicated DBS teams. The principal anatomical target used is subthalamic nucleus (STN) and, relative to the surgical technique, it emerges that in Italy DBS are bilaterally implanted in a single-step session with awake anesthesia and with frame-based technique. Final leads positioning is defined by microelectrode recordings (MER) and microstimulation (MS), with limited role of intraoperative neuroimaging (MRI and O-Arm). The stimulation is started at 15 or 30 days from procedure., Conclusions: Many centers of neurosurgery in Italy have a well-established DBS program for patients with advanced PD and some practical differences in technique between centers exist. Further investigation is needed to investigate specific criteria for selecting one technique over another.

Introduction: Deep brain stimulation (DBS) is currently considered a promising neuromodulation therapy for refractory epilepsy not suitable for resective surgery. Several anatomical targets and different stimulation approaches have been proposed in order to obtain satisfactory seizures reduction. As expected, according with different patterns of neural pathways involvement, the efficacy of each anatomical target stimulation in reducing seizure frequency varies among the different epileptic syndromes., Evidence Acquisition: We reviewed the current literature on this topic to provide an overview of the clinical efficacy of the main stimulation targets (anterior nucleus of the thalamus [ANT], hippocampus formation [HF] and centromedian nucleus of the thalamus [CMT]) related to the different epileptic syndromes. We also summarized the available data concerning side effects, neuropsychological outcome, quality of life and future perspective of DBS in intractable epilepsy., Evidence Synthesis: Encouraging results were reported for each target stimulation. However, only in ANT and responsive neurostimulation (RNS) the efficacy and safety were tested on large series of patients and achieving class I evidence level., Conslusions: We concluded that responsive stimulation could be more appropriate in focal epilepsy, while ANT stimulation could be properly performed also in multifocal seizures with predominant limbic involvement. Despite the small samples size, HF stimulation reduces seizure frequency in (bi) temporal lobe epilepsy, as well as CMT stimulation is able to reduce, seizure frequency, in generalized epilepsy.

Objective: The α2 agonist dexmedetomidine (DEX) is an anesthetic agent that can provide sedation and analgesia without respiratory depression or changes in neuronal activity during microrecordings. The aim of our study was to confirm the efficacy and safety of anesthesia with DEX for unilateral deep brain stimulation of the subthalamic nucleus (STN) in patients with Parkinson disease., Methods: In 2013 and 2014, a series of 11 consecutive patients received continuous low-dose DEX infusion during unilateral deep brain stimulation of the STN. Intraoperative microrecordings, stimulation results, and patient reaction times in executing verbal and motor tasks were retrospectively analyzed. Functional outcomes were evaluated by comparing preoperative and 1-year postoperative Unified Parkinson's Disease Rating Scale Part III scores., Results: Typical activity of the STN was recorded in all patients, and the delay in the execution of both motor and verbal tasks was ≤2 seconds. No hemorrhagic complications occurred, and no postoperative side effects were observed. The mean percentage of Unified Parkinson's Disease Rating Scale Part III improvement at last follow-up was 39.01% (range, 23.70%-55.60%). The mean percentage of levodopa equivalent dose reduction was 45.86% (range, 21.50%-65.70%)., Conclusions: The results of our study confirm that the use of DEX in managing patients with Parkinson disease during unilateral deep brain stimulation of the STN is safe and effective and can be considered a promising option for sedation during this type of procedure., (Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)