In Huntington''s chorea, embryonal brain tissue (striatum) was implanted in the caudate nucleus bilaterally, using stereotaxy assisted by CT. A special cannula allowed the placement into the brain of 3 or 4 grafts of embryonal tissue along the determined trajectory by one introduction of the cannula. The pathophysiological mechanism of neurotransplantation in Huntington''s chorea is to compensate for the degenerated striatal tissue by embryonal striatum, so it is necessary to supply a quantity of embryonal striatal tissue which enables the whole functional integrity. Therefore, we use material from several embryos.

A further trial of CT-oriented microrecording guided stereotactic selective thalamotomy was conducted at the Centra Internacional de Restauración Neurológica, Havana City as treatment of resting tremor in 11 patients with idiopathic Parkinson''s disease (PD), and in 3 other patients with intentional tremor associated with multisystemic atrophy and cerebral palsy. Three of the parkinsonian patients had undergone fetal mesencephalic tissue transplantation with significant improvement of the most debilitating symptoms of PD and stabilization of the motor state, but predominantly unilateral tremor had impaired them progressively despite increased levodopa doses. A Leksell frame was used with a novel surgical planning system and electrophysiological recordings to identify the optimal target point inside the ventralis intermedius. In all but 1 case, the tremor was totally arrested. No persistent complications were observed.

This paper summarizes the results of three controlled clinical trials related to the transplantation of embryonic ventral mesencephalic tissue into the striatum of 46 idiopathic parkinsonian patients exhibiting motor complications on standard levodopa therapy. From January 1988 to April 1990, 30 subjects with fluctuating Parkinson''s disease received fetal dopaminergic tissue implants by the open microsurgical technique. In March 1992 the stereotactic approach was adopted for successive fetal mesencephalic cell suspension transplants (7 unilateral and 9 bilateral) into the caudate and putamen of parkinsonian patients with levodopa-induced complex fluctuations and dyskinesias. The neurological assessment performed 12 months before and 3–18 months after transplantation demonstrated a reduction of both the daily time spent in the ''off condition and the number of daily ''off periods, and a significant improvement of the motor scale. The stereotactic selective thalamotomy with microelestrode recording was introduced in January 1993, in order to provide a further potential treatment strategy; i.e., the combination of the two surgical trends in Parkinson''s disease, the restorative neurotransplantation technique, and the selective lesional approach. In addition to that, microelectrode recording is also used for implantation site selection and functional characterization.

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From March 1991 to September 1993, 26 patients (aged 4–78 years) with brain tumors (4 glioblastoma multiforme, 10 nonglioblastoma multiforme, 1 mixed oligoastrocytoma, 2 carniopharyngiomas, 2 meningiomas and 7 metastases) were treated with stereotactic techniques at the Centro Internacional de Restauracion Neurológica, La Habana, Cuba. A total of 28 stereotactic surgical procedures were performed with no operative mortality; they included biopsies in all cases, 1 stereotactic microsurgical resection and 12 permanent implants of ¹⁹²Ir, followed by external beam fractionated radiation therapy (40–60 Gy). The present paper shows that the combined use of a stereotactic approach, a comprehensive and reliable stereotactic dosimetric planning system, stereotactic brachytherapy with ¹⁹²Ir and complementary percutaneous radiation treatment constitutes a promising strategy for brain tumor management.