Surgeons from University Hospitals Case Medical Center in Cleveland, Ohio made history on Sunday night as they preformed brain surgery on live national television and attempted to reduce the symptoms of a Parkinson’s disease patient through deep brain stimulation (DBS).
As cameras from National Geographic channel captured the action, neurosurgeons Dr. Jonathan Miller and Dr. Jennifer Sweet performed awake DBS on 49-year-old Greg Grindley in the hopes that it would alleviate some of his tremors, Digital Trends reported over the weekend.
The two-hour special, which aired in the US starting at 9pm on Sunday, showed live footage from inside the operating room at UH Case Medical Center as a fully-conscious Grindley gave instructions to the neurosurgeons regarding where to place a total of four electrodes. Placement is key, the doctors said, as it ensures the proper areas of the brain are being targeted.
Goal of the broadcast was to raise DBS awareness
DBS surgery was approved by the US Food and Drug Administration to treat essential tremors in 1997, and then for Parkinson’s disease five years later. It is only performed at select hospitals across the US, and unsurprisingly, Sunday marked the first time that the operation was televised.
In awake DBS, neurosurgeons make an opening in the patient’s skull to gain access to his or her brain, all while the patient remains conscious to communicate with doctors. While the procedure is only performed at a limited number of facilities by high specialized surgeons utilizing cutting-edge equipment, it has been around for over 10 years and is done quite frequently.
In a statement, Dr. Miller said that his team agreed to participate in the broadcast in order to help “demystify brain surgery, diminishing the fear and stigma of this operation.” He also told Digital Trends that many Parkinson’s patients “aren’t aware that we have these therapies available and a lot of patients suffer needlessly. Our goal is to publicize the problem and the solution.”
Grindley concurred, telling the website that he and his family ultimately decided “to share this experience with the world to open other people’s eyes to the remarkable procedure, and to give hope to those who are also suffering from tremors and Parkinson’s.”
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Feature Image: Thinkstock
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