Long Term rTMS Treatment

Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation has been used to improve a variety of different disorders as I have already previously mentioned on this blog. This treatment has been successful at altering brain functionality, showing the mind's inherent plasticity in response to electrical stimulation. Not a lot has been done to see how long researchers can maintain a clinically relevant response to rTMS. However, this aspect of rTMS is vitally important to how useful rTMS will be in the future management of brain disorders.

A recent study has come out testing rTMS on treatment resistant depressed patients over a longer period of time to see if they can sustain the antidepressant response. This is one of the few studies I have seen documenting a maintained antidepressant response to rTMS. This is important because it is currently not known how long rTMS can affect brain functioning.

Obviously having rTMS performed on you everyday for the rest of your life is not going to make this method of brain manipulation too popular. If scientists can maintain a response so you would only need rTMS once every couple of months, this would make this treatment option much more desirable for ameliorating mental illness.

RESULTS: Approximately one half of the patients individually sustained a clinically significant response to the repeated courses of rTMS; the mean +/- SD decrease in HAM-D scores was 64.8% +/- 12.6% (p < .0001), and, in BDI scores, 60.4% +/- 20.6% (p < .0001). Despite the lack of adjuvant antidepressant medication, the mean interval between treatment courses was approximately 5 months, and the medication-free period ranged from 26 to 43 months. Transcranial magnetic stimulation was well tolerated, and evaluations regarding the safety of the repeated applications of rTMS revealed no findings of concern. CONCLUSIONS: Repeated rTMS applications have demonstrated a reproducible antidepressant effect in patients with refractory depression who initially showed a clinically significant benefit. The duration of effect varied across patients, but benefits were sustained for a mean of nearly 5 months. Further studies with larger cohorts will be useful in determining the long-term effectiveness of rTMS maintenance therapy.