Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation uses magnet therapy to treat depression

Patients who have not responded to antidepressant medications for their depression are being enrolled in a clinical trial involving hundreds of patients nationwide. The study includes a placebo treatment.

• Psychiatrists at Rush University Medical Center are testing a noninvasive technique that uses repeated short bursts of magnetic energy to stimulate nerve cells in the brain to treat major depression.
• The therapy is called Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (TMS), and Rush is enrolling patients in a clinical trial to determine if TMS is safe and effective.
• "We think that this is landmark research for a new antidepressant treatment," said Dr. Philip Janicak, Rush psychiatrist and the principal investigator for the study at Rush.
• This study focuses on patients who have not responded to antidepressant medication for their depression.
• Information from this larger, more rigorous trial will be provided to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to support regulatory clearance of the Neuronetics TMS System for use in treating depression.
• Janicak explained that this study, which includes a placebo (or sham) treatment, is needed because some patients improve simply due to the added attention they receive in a research study.
• Neither the doctor nor the patient will know which treatment, the active TMS or the placebo, is being used.
• Transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) produces pulses of magnetic energy that are aimed at a specific portion of the brain, the left prefrontal cortex.
• TMS produces the same amount of magnetic energy as a standard MRI machine.
• However, instead of helping doctors look inside the body to diagnose disease, the pulses of magnetic energy produce an electric field that researchers believe causes positive changes in mood.
• "The amount of energy delivered to the brain is very small and very focused," Janicak said.
• Patients who qualify for the trial will initially receive 30 sessions over a period of six weeks.
• This new research study, which involves hundreds of patients nationwide, will be a pivotal trial.