NeuroStar transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) is a targeted noninvasive therapy that uses electromagnetic stimulation to reduce your symptoms of depression. Depression is a challenging and common mental health condition that can have devastating effects when left untreated.
Unfortunately, antidepressant medications do not work for everyone. After you have tried one or two prescription antidepressant medications without getting relief, the diagnosis changes to treatment-resistant depression.
TMS therapy is proven to be effective against treatment-resistant depression and offers hope for people whose lives have been significantly impacted. To understand how TMS affects depression, it helps to explore the history of TMS therapy and how this technique was developed.
Researchers have long been interested in how electricity could affect human tissue. Some of the early work that led to the development of a TMS device is traced back to the 18th century when bioelectricity was discovered. One researcher did experiments on frog legs and demonstrated that when electricity passes through tissue, it could cause muscles to contract.
This discovery laid the groundwork for future research in electrophysiology. Researchers recognized that understanding how electricity interacts with tissue was crucial if they wanted to develop a way to stimulate the brain without an invasive procedure. In the 1830s, Michael Faraday worked on electromagnetic induction, which proved to be another milestone in the work toward the TMS device.
He found that by changing the magnetic field, he could induce an electric current in a nearby conductor. This provided the theoretical base for using noninvasive electromagnetic stimulation to influence nerve activity. Researchers continued to explore ways of stimulating the brain and nervous system in the following 100 years.
However, those early attempts were crude and lacked precision. Scientists eventually experimented with bioelectricity and electromagnetism, which led to tools that were capable of noninvasive stimulation of brain activity.
In the late 19th century, researchers began working on electromagnetic fields to determine how they affected the human brain and other types of neural tissue. By the 1930s, researchers had developed electroconvulsive therapy (ECT). This was used on individuals with mental illness, and although it was effective in certain cases, there were significant drawbacks.
ECT passes an electric current through the brain to induce a seizure. It required anesthesia, was invasive, and was often accompanied by side effects. Researchers continued to look for less disruptive ways of using electromagnetic stimulation to influence brain activity. In the 1980s, they discovered transcranial electrical stimulation (TES), which used direct electrical currents but caused considerable discomfort.
TMS in its current form was developed in the early 1980s. Researchers at the Royal Hallamshire Hospital in Sheffield, England, leveraged Faraday’s principles of electromagnetic induction to develop the first device, which uses a magnetic coil to generate brief and focused magnetic fields to penetrate the skull and induce electric currents in the targeted areas of the brain.
The device was effective and stimulated the motor cortex, resulting in muscle movement. This was a pivotal discovery in neuroscience, proving that magnetic fields could interact with brain activity safely and effectively. TMS quickly became a valuable research tool—it helped scientists map how the brain works and gain a better understanding of the pathways. However, they did not immediately recognize the therapeutic potential, and it was not until later that TMS was adopted in a clinical setting.
In its early years, TMS was primarily used as a diagnostic and research tool. Over time, scientists recognized the promise it demonstrated in addressing major depressive disorder (MDD). After several research studies established its effectiveness, the FDA cleared NeuroStar TMS in 2008 as an MDD treatment for people who had not responded to conventional antidepressant medications.
Further clinical trials showed that the TMS therapy technique could be expanded to other diagnoses. The FDA later cleared TMS for the treatment of obsessive-compulsive disorder. Because TMS therapy is noninvasive, it has become an attractive alternative for people who have not responded to medications and do not want to use an invasive procedure.
Depression is a common but challenging mental health condition that requires care and treatment. If you are struggling with treatment-resistant depression, we encourage you to call our team at Synergy Strive and schedule a consultation to learn more about the history of TMS therapy and how it could improve your symptoms and quality of life.
