Vita gazette – Significant improvements were observed in 70% of Parkinson’s patients treated with the innovative “MRgFUS” therapy based on focused ultrasound.

For some years now, an innovative procedure has been introduced that can reduce the tremors, stiffness, and other typical signs of Parkinson’s disease, one of the most widespread neurodegenerative diseases in the world.

MRgFUS

The technique, called MRgFUS, an acronym for Magnetic Resonance guided Focused Ultrasound Surgery, or “Surgery based on focused ultrasound guided by Magnetic Resonance”, was welcomed with great favour by the medical community and patients, with the first machine going into operation in Italy in 2018. However, despite the approval and the results obtained in many patients, the efficacy of MRgFUS is still being examined by specialists, who are evaluating its medium-long-term impact in specific clinical trials.

One of the latest studies, published in The New England Journal of Medicine, showed that about 70 per cent of patients undergoing the minimally invasive treatment showed benefits, compared with 32 per cent of the control group undergoing a sham procedure.

The focused ultrasound technique, performed in an MRI machine, is based on the ultrasound ablation of the internal segment of the globus pallidus, a part of the brain responsible for regulating voluntary movement. In practice, ultrasounds cause temperatures to rise to such an extent as to cause a minimal lesion (ablation) on this portion of the brain. Thanks to this process, it is possible to reduce the characteristic motor symptoms of Parkinson’s disease.

Because the surgery is done while awake, patients can provide valuable real-time feedback to doctors. The benefits in symptoms, where they occur, are immediate. The researchers rate them through a specific scale called the Movement Disorders Society–Unified Parkinson’s Disease Rating Scale, part III (MDS-UPDRS III), which considers tremors, stiffness, walking ability, coordination, and other factors influenced by the neurodegenerative disease.

An international team conducted the research.

The effectiveness of MrgFUS was determined by an international research team led by scientists from the University of Maryland School of Medicine (UMSOM), who collaborated closely with colleagues at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, of Campal–HM Puerta Del Sur Comprehensive Neuroscience Center in Madrid, the University of Toronto and other institutes. Coordinated by Professor Howard Eisenberg, professor of Neurosurgery at the University of Maryland, the researchers involved a hundred volunteers in the study, all patients with Parkinson’s who had not benefited from drug treatment. They were divided into two groups: the first was subjected to the MrgFUS technique, and the second to a sham procedure (at the end of the study, the “real” treatment was also offered to the control group).

These results are encouraging.

As indicated, approximately 70% of treated patients achieved significant benefits in the 3-month follow-up period. In 66 per cent of them, the benefits persisted even more than a year after treatment. “These results are encouraging and offer Parkinson’s patients a new form of therapy to manage their symptoms. There is no incision involved, which means no risk of a serious infection or bleeding in the brain,” Professor Eisenberg said in a press release, clearly referring to the possible complications of deep brain stimulation, one of the standard treatments for Parkinson’s. Based on the implantation of electrodes in the brain.

It has been published in the authoritative scientific journal, The New England Journal of Medicine.