According to New Scientist, researchers at Johns Hopkins have a patent to treat nausea with an implantable metal rod. The implant would stimulate the vagus nerve in a pulsatile manner, adjustable to individual patients, and controlled by remote. The report (second item down) says:
A small metal rod, wrapped in a metallic coil, is inserted beneath the skin on a patient’s neck, close to the vagus nerve. When a similar coil is then held outside the neck and pulsed with low voltage current, the inserted rod should stimulate the vagus nerve and disrupt the sense of nausea felt by a patient.
JHU says that the strength and frequency of pulses must be set by a physician to suit the individual patient. But then a patient needs only to hold a battery-powered device to their neck and press a button when they feel uncontrollably sick.
One hopes that tinkering with this cranial nerve doesn’t affect its other functions, like slowing the heart. The Hopkins scientists assure us not to worry, but then again, they misspelled the title of their patent (“Method for Trating Nausea” ?)
More from the JHU patent(.PDF)…
Flashback: The body’s other brain…
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