Transcutaneous vagus nerve stimulation - A brief introduction and overview
Invasive cervical vagus nerve stimulation (VNS) is approved for the treatment of epilepsies, depression, obesity, and for stroke-rehabilitation. The procedure requires surgery, has side-effects, is expensive and not readily available. Consequently, transcutaneous VNS (tVNS) has been developed 20 years ago as non-invasive, less expensive, and easily applicable alternative. Since the vagus nerve reaches the skin at the outer acoustic canal and ear, and reflex-responses such as the ear-cough-reflex or the auriculo-cardiac reflex have been observed upon auricular stimulation, the ear seems w ell suited for tVNS.
Source: Autonomic Neuroscience: Basic and Clinical - Category: Neuroscience Authors: Max J. Hilz Tags: Review Source Type: research
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