Deep Brain Stimulation (DBS) is a treatment that uses Activa® Therapy, a brain stimulation technology developed by the Medtronic Neurological Therapy Development Group to deliver carefully controlled electrical impulses to precisely targeted areas of the brain involved in movement control.

It involves placing electrodes, thin flexible wires, through the skull into the deep parts of the brain. The device looks like a pacemaker; it is to the brain what a pacemaker is to the heart. An external battery is placed subcutaneously with wires not visible through the skin, which then enter the skull to reach deep parts of the brain, usually in one of the regions of the basal ganglia (nerve cell centers deep on each side of the brain, from which dystonia is thought to arise).

After the operation, adjustments must be made to the frequency and strength of the electrical stimulus presented to the nerve cells through the device. If the right adjustment is made regarding the speed of delivery and the strength of delivery, a remarkable improvement can be seen.

Deep brain stimulation has been granted a humanitarian device exemption by the FDA for the treatment of dystonia in 2003.

More and more people with cases of cervical dystonia are choosing this option. You must remember that this is a treatment and not a cure. It is not a quick fix operation. Treatment does not end after surgery.

A person must be programmed regularly by a trained neurologist every few months.