Taiwan’s China Post reported that doctors at the Buddhist Tzu Chi General Hospital in Hualien County, northeastern Taiwan, reported earlier this week that they have solved the problem of mood changes suffered by eight patients after they received deep brain stimulation (DBS) surgery to treat Parkinson’s disease.
According to Chen Shih-yuan, convener of the hospital’s Parkinson’s Clinical and Research Center, the hospital has treated 99 Parkinson’s disease patients since 2002 using the DBS therapy. He said that while most of the patients saw their quality of life improved because of the surgery, a few showed adverse changes of mood and often quarreled with their family members.
In order to understand the cause for these mood changes, Chen partnered with Tsai Sheng-tzung, chief resident at the hospital’s Department of Neurosurgery to undertake a study whereby 38 patients who received DBS surgery were placed under observation for more than one year. From this exercise, they concluded that a total of eight of the test subjects were affected by mood changes.
Comparison of research data between patients suffering from mood changes and those not affected by mood changes led to the finding that electrodes implanted in their brains were in apparently different areas of the thalamus than those patients who had no mood change problems. From this, the 8 patients who suffered from mood changes underwent additional surgery to adjust the positions of the electrodes in their brains, in conjuction with them taking medicine to stabilize their conditions. The researchers have thus far shown that the procedure has solved the problems of mood changes in the 8 patients.
Picture from Terumo Heart Inc.
Picture from Terumo Heart Inc.


