Rechargeable battery-powered bion/spl reg/ microstimulators for neuromudulation

Abstract

The rechargeable battery-powered bion microstimulator is designed to bring neurostimulation to mainstream medicine and improve the quality of life of those suffering from neurological disorders. The bion, through direct electrical stimulation of excitable tissues, is intended to treat numerous disorders including urinary urge incontinence, fecal incontinence, chronic headaches, peripheral pain, angina and obstructive sleep apnea. The rechargeable bion microstimulator, manufactured by Advanced Bionics Corporation, is designed to be implanted using a minimally invasive approach that would appeal to clinicians of different specialties as well as patients suffering from a wide variety of debilitating conditions. The bion is currently in clinical trials for the treatment of urinary urge incontinence and headaches. Other clinical trials are expected to follow in the future.

Peripheral Nerve Stimulation for Neuropathic Pain

“…The charging process takes less than two hours; the interval between charging depends on device usage and ranges from daily to every other week, with total battery-life expectation of up to 20 years. 75 …”

Microbattery Technologies for Miniaturized Implantable Medical Devices

“…Such batteries may be charged by inductive coupling, which can be applied to implant depths of ca. 12 cm [12].…”

“…Receveur's review is extremely comprehensive, citing 303 references, but barely addresses the question of power sources in general and batteries in particular. Miniaturized implanted biomedical devices include micro (or "neuro") stimulators [11][12][13][14] cochlear implants [15] and drug delivery microchips [16][17][18][19][20]. The powering of such devices requires similarly miniaturized implanted batteries.…”

“…These are IMDs which generally have size or form factor constraints, a good example being the BION neurostimulator [11][12][13], which has a cylindrical shape with a diameter of 3-3.2mm and a length of 28-31mm. Since the main topic is implantable batteries, power sources for active transdermal drug delivery [26][27][28], or external power sources coupled to IMDs are not addressed.…”

History of Peripheral Nerve Stimulation

“…The general trend for lowering invasiveness and reducing surgical trauma became the reason for development of new PNS device that may potentially revolutionize the entire PNS field. Introduced about 10 years ago [114,115], this miniaturized rechargeable stimulation device (Bion, Boston Scientific, Valencia, CA) has been tested in variety of clinical applications. In its current shape and size it was used in treatment of urinary incontinence [116] and subsequently tried for treatment of severe headaches [117,118].…”