Robot Cures Epilepsy

A £350,000 robot has helped a 15-year-old boy with epilepsy.

17:22 03 February 2016

15-year-old Billy Whitaker had suffered daily seizures for seven years. While a conventional surgery that removed part of his brain did not improve his condition, a new  £350,000 robot was able to identify the epicenter of his debilitating attacks with minute accuracy. This has helped the neurosurgeons remove the tiny piece of seizure-causing tissue.

 

Consultant neurosurgeon Michael Carter said: "There were little part of his brain we suspected were the candidates for causing these residual seizures.

 

"We used the robot to implant a series of electrodes using ultra-high, sub-millimetre precision, into these small areas of the brain, in order to see if his seizures were coming from them.

 

"In fact we located the area absolutely beautifully using one of the electrodes and on the strength of that we took him back to theatre a week later and we removed the area of brain tissue that was defined by the examination.

 

"We can use the robot to define extremely safe and high precision trajectories through the brain tissue, so that we can implant a number of electrodes through tiny little holes in the skull, with little stab incisions, directly into the areas we want.