As one of 20 centers in the United States that will conduct the double-blind study, UPMC will implant the device in up to 30 patients. Each patient will be evaluated for approximately 12 weeks after getting the device. Depression is more than just the blues. It is a serious psychiatric disorder that causes problems in relationships at home and at work. The disease affects about 5 percent of the population of the United States at any given time.
Women are twice as likely to suffer depression.
Numerous antidepressant drugs are available to treat the disease, and most people respond to a combination of drugs and talk therapy. However, approximately 30 percent of the estimated 1.5 percent of the general population with severe, recurrent episodes of depression has a form that is resistant to conventional treatment. The most commonly followed course of treatment for TRD is ECT, which, while effective, involves the repeated use of general anesthesia and requires multiple treatments over a period of several weeks or even months. Vagus nerve stimulation with the NCP system has been used safely in Europe for the treatment of epileptic seizures since 1994 and in the U.S. since 1997. The idea of using the NCP for the treatment of depression came about because doctors who used it to treat patients with epilepsy noticed that those patients' moods improved markedly.