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Recovery from Chronic Diseases of Consciousness: State of the Art in Neuromodulation for Persistent Vegetative State and Minimally Conscious State

  • Conference paper
Trends in Reconstructive Neurosurgery

Part of the book series: Acta Neurochirurgica Supplement ((NEUROCHIRURGICA,volume 124))

Abstract

Chronic diseases of consciousness (CDC) can still be considered a challenging frontier for modern medicine, probably because of their not completely understood physiopathological mechanisms. Following encouraging evidence on cerebral hemodynamics, some authors have hypothesized a role for neuromodulation in the treatment of CDC patients. In the past 40 years, spinal cord stimulation (SCS) and deep brain stimulation (DBS) have been used experimentally for the treatment of patients in a severe altered state of consciousness, with some interesting but not conclusive results. The present review summarizes the data currently available in the literature on this particular and debated topic. On these grounds, further clinical studies are needed to better understand the altered dynamics of neuronal network circuits in CDC patients as a step towards novel therapeutic strategies.

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Conflict of Interest Statement

We declare that we have no conflicts of interest.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Neurosurgery, Catholic University Medical School, Rome, Italy

    Pier Paolo Mattogno MD, Gaetano Pappalardo, Giuseppe LA Rocca & Francesco Signorelli

  2. Neurosurgery – A, Gemelli Hospital, Largo A. Gemelli, 8, Rome, 00168, Italy

    Pier Paolo Mattogno MD

  3. Division of Neurosurgery, Department of Neurosciences, Policlinico “G. Rodolico” University Hospital, Catania, Italy

    Giuseppe Barbagallo

  4. Department of Experimental Biomedicine and Clinical Neurosciences, School of Medicine, Neurosurgical Clinic, University of Palermo, Palermo, Italy

    Gerardo Iacopino

  5. Department of Neurosurgery, XinHua Hospital, Shanghai JiaoTong University School of Medicine, Shanghai, 200092, China

    Jun Zhong

  6. Institute of Neurosurgery, Medical School, Catholic University of Rome, Rome, Italy

    Massimiliano Visocchi MD

Authors
  1. Pier Paolo Mattogno MD
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  2. Giuseppe Barbagallo
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  3. Gerardo Iacopino
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  4. Gaetano Pappalardo
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  5. Giuseppe LA Rocca
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  6. Francesco Signorelli
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  7. Jun Zhong
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  8. Massimiliano Visocchi MD
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Pier Paolo Mattogno MD .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Neurosurgery Medical School, Catholic University of Rome, Rome, Italy

    Massimiliano Visocchi

  2. Dept. of Neurosurgery, Christian-Albrechts-University of Kiel, Kiel, Germany

    H. Maximilian Mehdorn

  3. Department of Neurological Surgery, Nihon University, Tokyo, Japan

    Yoichi Katayama

  4. Medical Faculty University of Münster, Münster, Germany

    Klaus R. H. von Wild

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Mattogno, P.P. et al. (2017). Recovery from Chronic Diseases of Consciousness: State of the Art in Neuromodulation for Persistent Vegetative State and Minimally Conscious State. In: Visocchi, M., Mehdorn, H.M., Katayama, Y., von Wild, K.R.H. (eds) Trends in Reconstructive Neurosurgery. Acta Neurochirurgica Supplement, vol 124. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-39546-3_4

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-39546-3_4

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-39545-6

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-39546-3

  • eBook Packages: MedicineMedicine (R0)

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