Luka Liebrand

“Optimizing DBS in psychiatric patients: targeting of specific white matter bundles?”

“Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) and depression patients who are treatment-resistant to cognitive-behavioral and pharmacological therapy may be eligible for treatment with deep brain stimulation (DBS). DBS is a novel technique in which electrodes are surgically implanted into the patient’s brain, where they stimulate the surrounding tissue with high-frequent electric pulses. Approximately 50% of treatment-resistant psychiatric patients respond well to DBS treatment (Denys et al., 2010; Bergfeld et al., 2016).

It is possible that differences in treatment outcome between patients are due to individual variance in neuroanatomy, which would suggest a strong correlation between electrode placement and treatment efficacy. The aim of this project is to identify the most optimal target for DBS treatment, so that treatment outcomes may be improved. Since the active stimulation site for DBS in OCD and depression patients lies in white matter (WM; v.d. Munckhof et al., 2013), the relative position of electrodes to specific WM bundles will be investigated with diffusion-weighted MRI.”