Winnipeg Free Press

Winnipeg Free Press (Newspaper) - September 24, 2000, Winnipeg, Manitoba Yamron is anxious As he arrives at the health sciences Centre in june. Yamron is lowered on to a table fora series of or i scans to map his brain for surgery. Yamron lies exhausted after surgery through which he remained conscious. In it i Brownstone above left tests Yamrone a Fine motor control. Below Yamron touches one of the a control wires protruding from his head before undergoing a procedure to Bury them in his Scalp. Above he celebrates his first photography by Phil Hossack future Uncertain in City for deep brain surgery wired / continued from Page by 111 Yamron pulled a stunt nobody expected the Day after the first surgery. Brownstone let him go Home but he did no to plan on resting. That morning for the first time in Ages Yamron tied his own shoelaces. He was elated. A it boggles my mind. It changes so quickly a Yamron says. Yamrone a recovery immediately after surgery is a honeymoon that comes from stimulating the brain. But it wears off after a few weeks which is Why the Battery pack is implanted a to restore feeling and movement. It was june 8, the Day the local Parkinson a foundation hosts an annual fund Raiser Golf tournament that Yamron never misses. A Community Booster Yamron dedicates his time to promoting the organization and the temptation to turn up in a Surprise appearance was too big to ignore. Yamron loves practical jokes especially if he a playing them. So instead of resting the Man and his entire family raced Down the Highway to Breezy Bend Golf course on the outskirts of Winnipeg. The clubhouse was packed with people lining the Walls when Yamron walked in. Their reaction was stunning. A most of my patients were there a Yamrone a neurologist or. Doug Hobson recalls. Hobson had been in the or 24 hours earlier with Yamron and neurosurgeon or. Rob Brownstone. Quot then i saw this Man in a Straw hat coming toward me a Hobson says. A i was thinking this Guy looks like Lan but it can to be. He a in the Hospital. Maybe its his a the had to come up to me and say a a it a Hobson believe his eyes. Quot he did a double take a Yamron chortle. When Wayne Buchannan vice president of the local Parkinson a foundation saw Yamron tears welled up in his eyes. Parkinson a patients weep easily a Side effect of medication that alters their brain chemistry. These tears that Day weren to caused by the pills. Buchannan saw Yamron walking a no Cane no shuffle hands steady with no tremors. Every Parkinson a patient in the room saw themselves in Yamron. His seemingly miraculous recovery hit them hard. A i cried a Buchannan says. A the Man is amazing. To see him is just great. One Day ill be Yamrone a own family was awed by the honeymoon effects. Daughter Brenlla Biggs resist teasing her dad. A you hear its brain surgery and you think he a going to be Down and out. We were More Down and out when we had our babies a Biggs says nodding to her sister. I i i four weeks after the second surgery Yamron returned to Hobsons office Quot tickled Pink to be there. Even though his tremor a and Many of the Parkinson a symptoms a had returned Yamron knew that he was about to get the Jolt of his life. His Battery pack implanted under his Collar was about to be juiced up. Quot in a so bloody excited Quot he says. Quot my last birthday was dec. 5. But in a going to have a new birthday and its going to be july 26.&Quot there Are two batteries in his Chest pack one with enough Power to run a watch for a year and the other slightly stronger about equal to a a Battery for a tape recorder. The batteries have a lifetime of five years then a new pack is implanted. Hobsons wife Parkinson a nurse Shawn Hobson Fine tuned the batteries to give Yamron Back his honeymoon feeling. It can take 40 hours to adjust the Battery pack to the right voltage and it took Hobson two Days to get the basics right. Then the Day after Yamrone a new birthday Hobson handed his patient his Remote control to turn on and off. Yamrone a wife Fraydell a features split into a genuine smile. What she says next collapses the room into laughter. A is there one More we have a habit of losing each Battery pack costs $9,000. Her next line is even better. A if he misbehaves i know what to do a i i i this fall Ian and Fraydel took his bionic implants on tour. The couple booked their first Holiday in years a three week bus tour of the maritime in Halifax the Yamros planned a get together with surgeon Brownstone who had moved there in August. The world still Isnit perfect for Yamron but its a lot better. He still loses his balance but now he can catch himself. Before he would just fall Over. He still takes medication but not nearly As much of it. And for the first time in a Long time the ritual response he gives when somebody greets him has a ring of truth. Should you go to his eatery Nathan Detroit a Sandwich pad in the concourse under Portage and main you might run into him. Ask him How he a doing. S Lam fantastic a hell Tell you. A but in a getting by Alexandra Paul the future of implant surgery that gave Parkinson a patient Ian Yamron his life Back is now Uncertain in Winnipeg. Or. Rob Brownstone the surgeon who performed the deep brain stimulation surgery has moved to Halifax and exacting new International standards for the operation May mean larger centres than Manitoba will be taking Over the surgery a at least for now. The Winnipeg regional health authority is building up the provinces drained neurosciences program and the future is wide open for potential growth doctors said. Recruited neurosurgeons or. Tony Kaufmann and or. Michael West were recruited this summer. Neither does the kind of implant surgery that Yamron received but West has an interest in surgeries like it that rely on Fri images and special frames called stereo toxic halos that make implant surgery possible. West raised in Winnipeg returned in september from the Cleveland clinic world renowned for its doctors. His expertise in neurovascular surgery for stroke victims is to be put to use in the or. Another specialist is to be recruited to work with new equipment that does non Surg Erical angioplasty inside the brain treating trauma and emergencies like aneurysms blood bubbles now treated with Standard surgery. The new procedures Call for a Multi million Dollar investment at health sciences Centre that also includes More clinic and office space to new Beds and a step Down unit for patients said Winnipeg regional health authority chief medical officer or. Brock Wright. Kaufmann is Here part time until the new year when he moves permanently from Calgary. Part of his duties include building up a team for a new Centre in cranial nerve disorders. Specialists currently in the City As Well As doctors to be recruited in neurosurgery and orthopaedic surgery Are to form another Centre this time for Complex spinal surgery. New radiation oncology equipment to be on line Early in the next year will allow doctors to treat some of those related brain injuries and diseases without surgery. The new recruits replenish the num Ber of surgeons to the provinces quota of seven. For some months a shortage dropped the ranks to five neurosurgeons compelling doctors who stayed Here to double up on work said or. Luis Oppenheimer head of surgery for the Winnipeg regional health authority. Oppenheimer praised Brownstone who performed Yamrone a surgery and did implant surgery on two other non Parkinson a patients this summer saying he Hopes he returns Here. Pioneer outside the or Brownstone remains a rising Star on the roster at the University of Manitoba a spinal Cord research Centre where his work made him a Pioneer in the new Frontier of transgenic mice and movement disorders such As Lou Gehrig a disease. The extra or work was what did him in Here a close colleague said. A in order to maintain his research career he Felt he had to leave. In Winnipeg he get enough time to do his research. There weren to enough neurosurgeons for the or a said the centres founder or. Larry Jordan. Some Day Brownstone wants to come a a Back Home to Winnipeg several doctors said. If you run out of a Oil your a motor starts to shake Adolf Hitler Francisco Franco Mao tse Tung Pope John Paul ii Yasser Arafat Janet Reno Muhammad Ali and Michael j. Fox Are or were All victims of Parkinson a disease. If everyone lived to 150, wed All get it. That a because the progressive neurological disorder is the result of an accelerated suicide of a Type of Black coloured nerve cells deep in the brain called cells of Nigra which die off naturally As we age. The cells lubricate the parts of the brain that keep us moving so As they die we slow Down. Parkinson a which strikes about one per cent of the population or 1,500 people in Manitoba freezes its victims affecting mobility and motor skills. Even facial expressions get wooden. The massive Nigra die off is responsible for the hallmark tremor that affects 70 per cent of Parkinson a sufferers. Symptoms cells of Nigra line a pair of Crescent shaped pans deep in the brain beneath two. Regions critical to mobility called the thalamus and Globus pallid us. Without Nigra the body can to produce dopamine a neurotransmitter picked up by the thalamus and Globus pallid us to keep us moving. Quot its like Oil in a motor a said neurologist or. Doug Hobson. A if your motor runs out of Oil it would slow Down and shake. That a the problem in Parkinson a. The dopamine is like the Oil in a when symptoms get severe doctors prescribe lev Dopa which the brain converts to dopamine. But eventually conventional prescriptions Wear off and they also pack Peculiar and disturbing Side effects like the writhing and twitching that plagues Parkinson a patients. In later stages tremors Are More pronounced and agility is replaced by rigidity. Sufferers move around with a slow shuffle and stooped posture. They take rapid Steps to keep from falling Forward. Depression strikes up to 40 per cent of sufferers. More controversial is the link with dementia. Up to to per cent Are thought to be afflicted. There Are four kinds of surgery including the Thal Zmotony that Michael j. Fox had performed. But All Are considered last resorts and Are performed on Only to per cent of Parkinson a patients. Irreversible Thal Zmotony and pallid Tomy which Are still considered experimental even though they be been around for 40 years both Stop tremors by destroying cells in either the thalamus the part of the brain that pushes you to move or in the adjacent Globus pallid us. Heating the cells or freezing them stops the Jerky movements but the surgeries Are irreversible. A third kind deep brain stimulation sees surgeons place electrodes in the thalamus or Globus pallid us and connect them to a pacemaker Impact that runs a current of electricity straight to the brain to Stop the tremors. It does not kill brain tissue. It Short circuits the faulty electrical conduit caused by errant cells. The surgery was pioneered by or. Alim Benebig a neurologist in Grenoble France where former Winnipeg neurosurgeon or. Rob Brownstone travelled As part of his training before he attempted implants. The procedure is now being tried with other disorders including to ease movement distortions of dystonia As Well As conditions that mimic Parkinson a and even for pain. The fourth and most controversial surgery involves the experimental implanting of fetal tissue in the brain. Nobody knows what causes Parkinson a let alone its cure. About 16 per cent of cases have a genetic link. Boxers like Muhammad Ali have a form of Parkinson a called the punch drunk syndrome that is thought to be triggered by blows in the head. Environment environment is another Factor linked to Parkinson a. University of Manitoba food scientist Michael Eskin who studied Parkinson a noted that the environmental link emerged with the death of a Young graduate student at Urcla 15 years ago. A the was a 21-year-old student and he died of Parkinson so said Eskin. The autopsy revealed the student had almost no Nigra cells left. Normally Parkinson a is thought of As an old persons disease striking most after age 60, with notable exceptions like Fox who was diagnosed at age 30. It turned out the student was synthesizing heroin in a University lab and a byproduct of his illicit Cookhouse was a chemical called a pop. A pop is known to have the potential to trigger Parkinson a. A suddenly the whole Parkinson a Field blew wide open a Eskin recalled. In Manitoba it fuelled a study on potatoes. It turned out the Way Industrial pollutants tinker with chemical functions in the Humble Spud is virtually the same Way enzyme functions Are distorted in the brains of Parkinson a patients ;