Deep Down Inside

Discovery

BBC

Science, Technology

4.3 • 1.2K Ratings

🗓️ 16 September 2013

⏱️ 29 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Deep brain stimulation (DBS) is a brain surgery technique involving electrodes being inserted to reach targets deep inside the brain. Those targets are then stimulated via the electrodes which are connected to a battery powered pacemaker surgically placed under the person's collar bone.

Geoff Watts finds out how the technique has been used successfully for treating the movement disorders of Parkinson's disease, in patients with severe, intractable depression, in chronic pain and how it's also being trialled to see if it can also be successful in treating obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD), Tourette's syndrome and other disorders.

Geoff meets patients who have had their lives changed by having deep brain stimulation. He also meets the surgeons at the operating table to find out how it works. At the moment no one has all the answers but one psychiatrist he meets says the success of deep brain stimulation means we should radically change the way we understand how the brain works: that the brain is governed by electrical circuitry rather than a chemical soup of neurotransmitters.

Picture: Functional brain imaging allows scientists to see inside a living, human brain

Transcript

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0:11.8	telly we share what we've been watching
0:14.0	Cladie Aide.
0:16.0	Load to games, loads of fun, loads of screaming.
0:19.0	Lovely. Off the telly with me Joanna Paige.
0:21.0	And me, Natalie Cassidy, so your evenings can be a little less
0:24.9	searching and a lot more auction listen on BBC sounds just before this
0:30.3	BBC podcast gets underway here's something you may not know.
0:34.4	My name's Linda Davies and I commission podcast for BBC Sounds.
0:38.3	As you'd expect, at the BBC we make podcasts of the very highest quality featuring the most knowledgeable experts and genuinely
0:46.0	engaging voices. What you may not know is that the BBC makes podcasts about all kinds of things like pop stars,
0:54.2	poltergeist, cricket, and conspiracy theories.
0:57.6	And that's just a few examples.
0:59.4	If you'd like to discover something a little bit unexpected, find your next podcast over at BBC
1:05.1	Sounds. Just before this BBC podcast gets underway, here's something you may not know.
1:10.7	My name's Linda Davies and I commissioned podcasts for BBC Sounds.
1:14.0	As you'd expect at the BBC we make podcasts of the very highest quality
1:19.0	featuring the most knowledgeable experts and genuinely engaging voices.
1:24.0	What you may not know is that the BBC makes podcasts about all kinds of things,
1:29.0	like pop stars, poltergeist, Cricket, and Conspiracy Theories.
1:34.0	And that's just a few examples.
	...

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