More Indications for VNS Treatment

摘要

Encouraging research emerged last month regarding vagus nerve stimulation (VNS) for the treatment of epilepsy patients. About 25 different presentations at the American Epilepsy Society’s annual meeting in New Orleans focused on VNS. The FDA approved VNS Therapy in July 1997 as an adjunctive treatment for adults and children older than 12 years with partial-onset seizures and resistance to antiepileptic drugs. Marketed by Cyberonics Inc, of Houston, Tex, VNS Therapy is the only FDA-approved electrical stimulation device for epilepsy. The device, which resembles a pacemaker, provides intermittent electrical stimulation to a patient’s left vagus nerve, which, in turn, activates areas of the brain. It is implanted in the left chest area, and wires run under the skin to the nerve in the neck.