Can Ultrasound Wake Up People Trapped in Long-Term Coma-Like States?
A simplified summary of the research
Ultrasonic Thalamic Stimulation in Chronic Disorders of Consciousness
Cain, J. A., Spivak, N. M., Coetzee, J. P., Crone, J. S., Johnson, M. A., Lutkenhoff, E. S., Real, C., Buitrago-Blanco, M., Vespa, P. M., Schnakers, C., Monti, M. M.
- Disorders of Consciousness
- Clinical Trial
- Focused Ultrasound
What's the Point?
People in chronic disorders of consciousness can persist for years with minimal responsiveness. Deep brain stimulation of the thalamus has helped in rare surgical cases, but a non-invasive option had never been tested.
The world's first clinical trial of MR-guided focused ultrasound aimed at the thalamus in chronic post-coma patients. Behavior was tracked with the CRS-R before and after each sonication.
The procedure was feasible and safe. A subset of participants showed meaningful recovery of communication and improved CRS-R scores after non-invasive thalamic ultrasound.
Establishes non-invasive thalamic ultrasound as a candidate therapy for disorders of consciousness and motivates the sham-controlled trials that followed.
From the manuscript
We report the first clinical trial applying MR-guided low-intensity focused ultrasound to the thalamus in chronic disorders of consciousness. The procedure was feasible and safe, and a subset of participants showed meaningful recovery of communication and improved Coma Recovery Scale-Revised scores, establishing non-invasive thalamic neuromodulation as a candidate therapy that warrants sham-controlled trials.
Cain, J. A., Spivak, N. M., Coetzee, J. P., Crone, J. S., Johnson, M. A., Lutkenhoff, E. S., Real, C., Buitrago-Blanco, M., Vespa, P. M., Schnakers, C., & Monti, M. M. (2021). Ultrasonic thalamic stimulation in chronic disorders of consciousness. Brain Stimulation, 14(2), 301–303.