MRI-guided high-intensity focused ultrasound (HIFU) thalamotomy is an FDA-approved treatment for tremor-dominant Parkinson’s disease . However, a major drawback of this method is a lack of clear demarcation of the target. This can lead to several side effects, including paresthesia, weakness, and numbness. Researchers from UT Southwestern have developed a novel four-tract tractography-based variation of HIFU that significantly improves the accuracy of this method.
In this study, 18 patients were treated with this novel MRI-guided HIFU method and followed up for three months. The key findings include: Successful resolution of hand tremors in all study participants. Improvement in the average Archimedes spiral score of 84% and 81% was noticed at one and three months of follow-up, respectively. The transient imbalance was the only adverse effect observed and was reported in three…
