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Spinal implant allows Parkinson’s patient to walk for miles (www.engadget.com)

submitted 1 year ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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A Parkinson’s patient can now walk 6km (3.7 miles) thanks to an implant targeting the spinal cord. The Guardian reports that the man — 62-year-old “Marc” from Bordeaux, France — developed severe mobility impairments from the degenerative disease. “I practically could not walk anymore without falling frequently, several times a day,” he said in a press release announcing the breakthrough. “In some situations, such as entering a lift, I’d trample on the spot, as though I was frozen there, you might say.” Wearing the spinal implant allows him to walk “almost normally” as the research team eyes a full clinical trial.

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[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 year ago (1 children)

The company I work for makes similar devices. We make spinal chord stimulators https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spinal_cord_stimulator and deep brain stimulators https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_brain_stimulation

The change in people is amazing. That said your estimate is not far off for cost of just the implantable generators, plus the leads. Add on cost of surgery and doctors bills and hospital stays and your probably under estimating.

Not to mention typically it's the last choice for pain treatment, so it's a the end of typically years of pain. Also it only lasts for about a dacade due to the battery so you will need to repeat the surgery and buy a new device periodically.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Why not make the battery port to be located outside of the body? So that you'll only replace the battery without changing the whole thing

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

It's a pacemaker battery. They use induction charging. A cable runs down the neck to connect to it. The charger just kind of magnets on there. The charger is also where you connect to the onboard software and choose what settings you want. Dad's had a specialized device for that. I can imagine a smartphone connection eventually, but with the security concerns I imagine that's not likely to happen soon.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

You are almost completely correct. It does have wireless charging but like your cell phone eventually the life of a rechargeable battery wears and needs to be replaced.

That you are wrong about the last part. Our latest two generations actually use ipads for the doctors and iphones for the patient. I don't know too much about the security on them as that's my area of knowledge. That said unlike a pacemaker our devices don't keep people alive. They lessen movement disorders and reduce pain but people won't die if they get turned off.