MEDICAL DEVICES:

The search for a definitive treatment for depression has consumed a great deal of money without visible progress. The search for a cause has been no more productive. If anything, it has yielded discoveries that seem to expand the magnitude of the problem.

For the 30 percent of patients who find no relief from drugs—there are some 4 million in the United States alone—these shortcomings are a serious matter. Using electricity to treat depression is hardly new, but newer neuromodulation devices, as these are called, don’t achieve their therapeutic benefit by inducing seizures. Instead, they rely on a smaller and more consistent electric current to provoke a reaction in brain circuitry.