Clinical applications of TMS

Researchers at Le Bonheur recently published an overview of the clinical applications of transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) in the Journal of Child Neurology. The team discusses the basic principles and safety of the noninvasive brain stimulation method that is used as a diagnostic aid and in the treatment of neuropsychiatric disorders in adults and increasingly in children.

TMS imparts magnetic fields that penetrate the skull painlessly to stimulate areas of the brain, using a coil that is placed near the scalp in a form of non-invasive cortical stimulation. Navigated TMS uses an MRI of the patient’s brain to move across the skull – much like a GPS system helps a person navigate a car. The data gathered from TMS allows clinical neuroscientists to connect brain activation and the responses that follow for motor and language.

“We’ve found that TMS is a safe and non-invasive means of localizing motor and language functions in the brain of pediatric patients. It’s an important tool in presurgical planning in our practice,” said TMS Lab Director Shalini Narayana, MBBS, PhD.

In the article, the team demonstrates the clinical utility of functional mapping in pediatric neurology practices in four cases including presurgical evaluation, cortical dysplasia and cortical reorganization. In addition, the merits of TMS functional mapping are compared with Magnetoencephalography and Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging.

Narayana S, Papanicolaou AC, McGregor A, Boop FA, Wheless JW. Clinical Applications of Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation in Pediatric Neurology. J Child Neurol published online 23 October 2014