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What Dr. Kim Burchiel does is literally shocking. He wants to treat obesity using an electrode wired to your brain.
At Oregon Health and Science University, Burchiel was the first doctor in North America to use a treatment called Deep Brain Stimulation" to help control the tremors that can make life unbearable for patients with Parkinson's disease.
The electrode acts like a pacemaker for the brain, delivering little electrical impulses to targeted areas, and has also been used successfully for epilepsy and depression.
Burchiel is now at the forefront of using Deep Brain Stimulation to help treat a condition that plagues a huge number of Americans: morbid obesity. He believes that in a great number of obese people, the problem can be found not just in the pituitary glands but in the circuitry of the brain. By stimulating the brain's "feeding center," doctors may be able to curb appetite.
Burchiel, department chair of OHSU's neuroscience department for almost 30 years, has become an entrepreneur, founding a company called CereMod Inc to explore treatment of morbid obesity with DBS. He'll talk about his new endeavor in his talk, Is Your Brain is Making You Fat? Using deep brain stimulation to treat obesity.
Dr. Burchiel on Deep Brain Stimulation
Dr. Burchiel is the former President of the American Board of Pain Medicine, Society of University Neurosurgeons and Society of Neurological Surgeons. Last year, Dr. Burchiel was awarded the American Association of Neurological Surgeons distinguished service award, one of neurosurgery's top honors.
Join Dr. Kim Burchiel and our other excellent speakers at TechFestNW 2016: April 25-26 at The Armory in Portland, Oregon's Pearl District. For more information or tickets to TFNW, visit techfestnw.com.
Willamette Week