How deep brain stimulation treatment could treat disorders that affect movement

Neurosurgeons make two holes, each a few millimetres wide, in the top of the patient's skull

They implant two electrodes called neurostimulators deep into an area of the brain called the globus pallidus internus containing the body's ‘off-switch’, which controls movement. They go in a few centimetres apart, one on the left and one on the right

The four contacts on each electrode, which are powered by a pacemaker- type device inserted under the skin in a child's abdomen, send fast electrical pulses down the wires, about 130 times per second, which, it is hoped, will over time will start to normalise the patient's movements

How deep brain stimulation treatment could treat disorders that affect movement

Neurosurgeons make two holes, each a few millimetres wide, in the top of the patient's skull

They implant two electrodes called neurostimulators deep into an area of the brain called the globus pallidus internus containing the body's ‘off-switch’, which controls movement. They go in a few centimetres apart, one on the left and one on the right

The four contacts on each electrode, which are powered by a pacemaker- type device inserted under the skin in a child's abdomen, send fast electrical pulses down the wires, about 130 times per second, which, it is hoped, will over time will start to normalise the patient's movements