Can brain surgery help slow the progression of Alzheimer's disease?
A new clinical trial is now enrolling for a type of brain surgery, known as deep brain stimulation.
That’s the type used to help control tremors in Parkinson's disease patients.
In New England, Rhode Island hospital is the only site enrolling for this novel trial.
"There's a natural reluctance to have brain surgery done,” said Dr. Wael Asaad, a neurosurgeon and one of the co-principal investigators in the Alzheimer's disease study known as ADvance II.
"This therapy has been around for a long time. It is relatively low risk compared to other brain surgeries,” said Dr. Umer Akbar, a neurologist and the other principal investigator, both of them out of Brown University and Rhode Island Hospital.
Those who enroll in this study will have the surgery that involves implanting a device that delivers electrical pulses to specific parts of the brain responsible for Alzheimer's.
"We're hoping to improve the memory function,” said Akbar.
In an earlier study they were involved in, stimulating the part of the brain responsible for memory showed some benefit for patients 65 and older with mild memory loss.
"For this study, we're hoping to achieve something similar which is to put the electrodes, the wires, into the memory circuit and improve the memory function of these individuals,” said Akbar.
Only this time, they hope to improve upon the earlier results.
"From my point of view, deep brain stimulation is a very sort of tried and true technology. It's one of our sort of core technologies in neurosurgery,” said Asaad. "In reality, the risks are quite low and you know I think the biggest risk is it simply just doesn't work. But, I think there's enough hope that it might work that I think we all believe it's worth a shot."
To qualify for this research, you must be 65 or older and have a diagnosis of mild Alzheimer’s disease.