Refractory epilepsy and deep brain stimulation

Up to one-third of all patients with epilepsy have epilepsy refractory to medical therapy. Surgical options include temporal lobectomy, focal neocortical resection, stereotactic lesioning and neurostimulation. Neurostimulatory options comprise vagal nerve stimulation, trigeminal nerve stimulation and deep brain stimulation (DBS). DBS enables structures in the brain to be stimulated electrically by an implanted pacemaker after a minimally invasive neurosurgical procedure and has become the therapy of choice for Parkinson’s disease refractory to or complicated by drug therapy. Here we review DBS for epilepsy, a powerful emerging treatment in the surgical armamentarium for drug refractory epilepsy, with a focus on extratemporal epilepsy.