Moncton Hospital becomes first in N.B. to offer deep brain stimulation for Parkinson’s disease

Beginning this month, the Moncton Hospital will be using new equipment for a procedure that is used to treat patients with Parkinson’s disease and other movement disorders.

The treatment, deep brain stimulation, involves implanting thin electrodes into the brain, which emit tiny electrical pulses. 

Those pulses can alleviate the symptoms of some neurological disorders, including Parkinson’s — a chronic but not fatal disease that can cause rigidity, tremors, instability, difficultly swallowing and pain, among other symptoms.

“We know Parkinson’s disease is a serious disease that impacts the motor function of patients — my father-in-law had Parkinson’s — and we know that this treatment is not a cure,” said Health Minister Bruce Fitch during the announcement in Moncton on Monday.

“But it does help patients for whom the medications are no longer effective or cause more symptoms than they effectively treat.”

According to the Government of Canada, approximately 84,000 Canadians, aged 40 and older, were living with diagnosed parkinsonism, which includes Parkinson’s disease, according the the most recent statistics from 2013-14.

The equipment for deep brain stimulation cost $250,000, raised by donations to the Friends of the Moncton Hospital Foundation. The Department of Health is also providing nearly $400,000 in annual operational funding. 

Fitch said the surgery will be covered through Medicare. 

For nearly 40 years, neurologists have been experimenting with deep brain stimulation to treat Parkinson’s and other movement disorders. The procedure must be performed by highly specialized surgical teams.

Dr. Antonios El Helou will use the Moncton Hospital equipment for the first time this month for a deep brain stimulation procedure. 

During the announcement, El Helou said that almost 200 New Brunswickers are diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease every year. 

He said although deep brain stimulation began as a surgery just for Parkinson’s, it is also used for other conditions.

“We do DBS for epilepsy, we do DBS for depression, we do DBS for OCD we do DBS for chronic pain, and lately, there is some improvement in DBS for rehabilitation in stroke patients,” he said. 

“The [advantages] of DBS are many. Most important is patient quality of life and improvement, but it has a big economical impact, where people can return to work, they can lower their medication consumption, they can decrease the emergency room visit and hospitalization.”

According to a 2023 report from Canada’s Drug Agency, Alberta, British Columbia, Manitoba, Nova Scotia, Ontario, Quebec and Saskatchewan have deep brain stimulation programs.

El Helou said the functional neurosurgery program at the Moncton Hospital doesn’t serve only New Brunswickers, but also Prince Edward Islanders.

Rob Herd, a Salisbury resident originally from Ontario, was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease eight years ago.

While still living in Ontario, he was accepted as a deep brain stimulation patient at the Toronto Western Hospital. He had the surgery and now visits the neuromodulation clinic at the Saint John Regional Hospital for followup appointments every six months.

Herd said the benefit of the procedure was being able to cut his medication regime in half.

“It’s a learning curve for all of us, but the benefit for me, for the DBS, was that I was at a high dosage of medication and basically cut my medication in half.”

This story was originally published in CBC News on June 10, 2024.