Comment on Spinal implant allows Parkinson’s patient to walk for miles

• ripcord@kbin.social ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

  God damn a bunch of sad sacks in this thread

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  • magnetosphere@kbin.social ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

    A large part of the American healthcare system is made of for-profit businesses. Capitalism and genuinely empathetic healthcare are mutually exclusive, and the parts that work have only managed to do so because of a shit-ton of regulation. Regulation that corporations are constantly fighting and struggling to weaken. They buy politicians to help.

    Pharmaceutical companies will claim that drug prices are high because R&D is so expensive, but that didn’t stop them from fighting for the right to advertise prescription drugs on TV. Last I read, only the U.S. and Australia allow that. Producing and airing those ads can cost millions. R&D is expensive, but apparently not so expensive that they can’t afford that. Capitalism does not have a conscience.

    I’m a sad sack because I’ve seen (and am currently seeing) friends and family members get screwed by a system that allegedly exists to help them, but really just profits off their pain. I know I’ll probably end up being exploited, too.

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    • ripcord@kbin.social ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

      Ok, but it's really nice that there's a new treatment giving a dude a way better quality of life and give hope to others.

      We don't have to immediately turn everything into sadness. Sometimes stuff can be good, without a bunch of people trying to figure out why it sucks because everything sucks and woe is the world.

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      • magnetosphere@kbin.social ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

        You know what! You’re right.

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    • ultra@feddit.ro ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

      Romania also allows ads for medicine.

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  • misanthropy@lemm.ee ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

    Some of us have had to deal with the American healthcare system :).

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• vrek@programming.dev ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

  The company I work for makes similar devices. We make spinal chord stimulators en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spinal_cord_stimulator and deep brain stimulators en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_brain_stimulation

  The change in people is amazing. That said your estimate is not far off for cost of just the implantable generators, plus the leads. Add on cost of surgery and doctors bills and hospital stays and your probably under estimating.

  Not to mention typically it’s the last choice for pain treatment, so it’s a the end of typically years of pain. Also it only lasts for about a dacade due to the battery so you will need to repeat the surgery and buy a new device periodically.

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  • Black_Gulaman@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

    Why not make the battery port to be located outside of the body? So that you’ll only replace the battery without changing the whole thing

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    • HeyThisIsntTheYMCA@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

      It’s a pacemaker battery. They use induction charging. A cable runs down the neck to connect to it. The charger just kind of magnets on there. The charger is also where you connect to the onboard software and choose what settings you want. Dad’s had a specialized device for that. I can imagine a smartphone connection eventually, but with the security concerns I imagine that’s not likely to happen soon.

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      • vrek@programming.dev ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

        You are almost completely correct. It does have wireless charging but like your cell phone eventually the life of a rechargeable battery wears and needs to be replaced.

        That you are wrong about the last part. Our latest two generations actually use ipads for the doctors and iphones for the patient. I don’t know too much about the security on them as that’s my area of knowledge. That said unlike a pacemaker our devices don’t keep people alive. They lessen movement disorders and reduce pain but people won’t die if they get turned off.

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• Madison420@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

  Bingo. Parkinson’s and ms treatments already aren’t cheap.

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