{"id":12594,"date":"2025-12-12T01:27:55","date_gmt":"2025-12-12T01:27:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/?p=12594"},"modified":"2025-12-12T01:27:57","modified_gmt":"2025-12-12T01:27:57","slug":"you-gave-me-my-life-back","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/2025\/12\/you-gave-me-my-life-back\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cYou Gave Me My Life Back\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\u201cYou gave me my life back!\u201d One patient with Parkinson\u2019s Disease expressed their gratitude to the nurse practitioner on a neurosurgery team after receiving Deep Brain Stimulation (DBS).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The three-part surgical procedure involves placing two leads (electrodes) in the brain that connect to a battery in the chest through extension wires. The electrical stimulation from the electrodes helps alleviate tremors, stiffness, slowness and dyskinesia. I learned this while shadowing Meredith Spadaccia, a nurse practitioner, for six weeks as a Summer Volunteer at Mount Sinai West Hospital. Patients come to get this surgery when medication alone is no longer able to manage their Parkinson\u2019s symptoms. <\/p>\n\n\n

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Source: Parkinson\u2019s NSW\u00a0<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

However, many people are reluctant to undergo DBS as there are certain risks. They worry about strokes, even though the risk is only around one percent<\/a>, according to a major university hospital report. There are also psychological hurdles. \u201cThere is misinformation on the internet about the procedure causing personality changes,\u201d said Meredith Spadaccia.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Additionally, \u201cSomething unique with Parkinson\u2019s patients is that you\u2019re working with people who have impaired levels of dopamine,\u201d explained Spadaccia. Dopamine is a neurotransmitter that gives you feelings of satisfaction and motivation. It\u2019s much harder for these patients to feel the dopamine boost that encourages risk-taking. To help patients overcome this mental obstacle, \u201cwe remind them of how frequently DBS is performed, and how it has been around for decades. It\u2019s about normalizing the situation.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

After the DBS hardware (electrodes, lead and battery) is fully set up, patients receive custom programming to optimize their symptom management. During programming sessions, the amplitude, frequency and pulse width<\/a> of the electrical stimulation are adjusted to target specific Parkinson\u2019s symptoms unique to every patient. This process often requires multiple visits over several weeks to determine the best settings for a given patient.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When programmed effectively, Spadaccia\u2019s team helps patients balance their daily medication intake. She explained, \u201cA few weeks after surgery\u2019s done, we try to reduce medication by slowly titrating down.\u201d Decreasing dosages and frequency might not seem impactful, but not having to take pills every two hours to manage symptoms can improve quality of life. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Spadaccia often recalls heartwarming moments that remind her why she chose this profession in the first place. Her grandfather had Parkinson\u2019s, and seeing him suffer made her want to care for others. \u201cYou don\u2019t often get to hear ‘You gave me my life back.\u2019\u201d There is currently no cure for Parkinson\u2019s disease, but as Deep Brain Stimulation technology evolves, it offers many patients a second chance at life. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cYou gave me my life back!\u201d One patient with Parkinson\u2019s Disease expressed their gratitude to the nurse practitioner on a neurosurgery team after receiving Deep Brain Stimulation (DBS). The three-part surgical procedure involves placing two leads (electrodes) in the brain that connect to a battery in the chest through extension wires. The electrical stimulation from the electrodes helps alleviate tremors, stiffness, slowness and dyskinesia. I learned this while shadowing Meredith Spadaccia, a nurse practitioner, for<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":386,"featured_media":12597,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[318,385,566],"tags":[],"coauthors":[643],"class_list":["post-12594","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-science","category-summer-narrative"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/Screenshot-2025-12-11-at-8.25.37-PM-e1765502778371.png","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12594","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/386"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12594"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12594\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12598,"href":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12594\/revisions\/12598"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12597"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12594"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12594"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12594"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=12594"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}