Patent ID: 8914114

Claim:
A method for providing therapy to a patient suffering from a condition mediated by an inflammatory cytokine cascade, wherein the method comprises: mechanically stimulating vagus nerve activity by applying mechanical force comprising a plurality of mechanical stimulations in an amount sufficient to inhibit the inflammatory cytokine cascade by at least 20% over the untreated state, and wherein the condition mediated by the inflammatory cytokine cascade is selected from the group consisting of appendicitis, ulcerative colitis, Crohn's disease, allergy, organ ischemia, reperfusion injury, sepsis, endotoxic shock, allograft rejection, arthritis, systemic lupus erythematosus, pancreatitis, peritonitis, hepatitis, burns, Behcet's syndrome, graft-versus-host disease, multiple sclerosis, atherosclerosis and cachexia; and monitoring a marker of the patient's inflammatory cytokine cascade.