Summary and Future Directions of Therapeutic Brain Stimulation: Neurostimulation and Neuropsychiatric Disorders

Technologies that use electromagnetism applied to nervous tissue for the purpose of neurostimulation have made rapid advancements in recent years. This leap forward in brain treatment challenges the traditional categorical divisions between neurologists, psychiatrists, and neurosurgeons. The therapy itself invites a rethinking of terminology as physicians debate its place within standard therapeutic models. Several areas of concern have manifested themselves in regard to this therapy. Physicians must proceed cautiously and work to overcome understandable suspicions about these new developments owing to past abuses involving invasive brain therapies. More information is needed about how the brain works at a systemic level. A better model of how brain stimulation tools function as ablates or augments must be created. Data involving the various techniques of neurostimulation should be meta-analyzed to find commonalities in their mechanisms of action. These technologies are only in their infancy, and the debates and discoveries promise to continue for years to come. (C) 2001 Academic Press