A ‘Pacemaker for the Brain’: No Treatment Helped Her Depression — Until This

It’s the first study of individualized brain stimulation to treat severe depression. Sarah’s case raises the possibility the method may help people who don’t respond to other therapies.

Driving home from work in Northern California five years ago, a young woman was so overwhelmed with depression that all she could think about was ending her life.

“I couldn’t stop crying,” recalled Sarah, now 38. “The thought that consumed me the entire way on that road was just driving my car into the marshland so I can drown.”

She made it home, but soon after, moved in with her parents because doctors considered it unsafe for her to live alone. No longer able to function at work, she quit her health technology job.