Deep brain stim­u­la­tion (DBS) is a pro­ce­dure in which a ‘brain pace­maker’ is implanted into a patient’s brain. This ‘pace­maker’ then sends elec­tri­cal impulses to spe­cific areas of the brain in order to alle­vi­ate the symp­toms of typ­i­cally treatment-resistant conditions.

Mind Hacks has made a list of the con­di­tions treated using DBS:

  • Obe­sity
  • Writer’s cramp
  • Tremor
  • Depres­sion
  • Parkinson’s dis­ease
  • Epilepsy
  • Huntingdon’s dis­ease
  • Addic­tion
  • Self-mutilation
  • Clus­ter headache
  • Tourette’s syn­drome
  • OCD
  • Early onset pan­tothen­ate kinase-associated neurodegeneration
  • Dys­to­nia
  • Meige syn­drome
  • Facial pain
  • Accord­ing to the com­ments, anorexia ner­vosa too.

Blue­grass musi­cian Eddie Adcock recently under­went DBS surgery to treat tremors that were pre­vent­ing him from play­ing. Via Mind Hacks, the BBC has a video of Adcock play­ing banjo whilst hav­ing surgery as a way to test the surgery’s suc­cess. (If you can’t see the embed­ded video, an ABC News report of the surgery has been uploaded to YouTube.)