cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/15666607
Non-invasive zaps to the spinal cord can treat paralysis—but no one knows why
Just because no one knows how it works doesn’t mean you can’t perfect it’s use with trial and error.
True, but the difference is like trying to throw a dart at a bullseye with your eyes closed, vs a bench top rifle and a 10x scope. An exact understanding of why could much more quickly lead to hitting that bullseye and making it work 10 fold faster and better. Aspirin started off as people chewing on tree bark and getting stomach pain as a side effect of removing another pain. We figured out how and why it worked, removed wood chewing, removed the stomach pain, and were then also able to develope other pain killers based on how it worked, like ibuprofen, naproxen, and other nsaids.
There’s no real reason you can’t develop both simultaneously. I’m not discounting the need to find a root cause. Of course it would have substantial benefits as you describe. However, sometimes it’s better to make marginal improvements to be able to better help people right now than to wait 20 years until we understand the why’s. Medical breakthrough can take quite a while sometimes (sometimes never).
But we can fucking guess right? Like maybe the linking network gets a fuckin hint…“the leg is this way you retard!” But in a shock.
considering how synapses in the brain get stronger if both neurons fire, and how paralysis is most of the time caused by a severance in the connectivity of 2 (or way more) neurons…
Yeah this looks like it could be the reason why
P.S: This comment is made with not much knowledge in anatomy (past highschool level), take with a shaker of salt
Yup my comment is also made with very little to no googling. I’m sure there’s a big reason why we … probably because you can’t be testing things on actual people. It would be horrible to watch someone explain how they figured out that the spinal chord does X because when you shock Z you get a twitch on Y. It’s all the twitching.
Good news, nobody knows why this works!
Just kidding, it’s better than no news!
I had the idea that electricity had been tried for paralysis, and I looked it up and ben franklin did experiments to try and cure it with shocks.
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/16717219/
I wonder if the difference was targeting? The type of paralysis? The podcast Sawbones did an episode on the history of electricity in medicine that was pretty interesting. I might relisten.
Most of current medicine falls into the same cayegory. Like allergy shots. Trail and error. Most diagnosis by general practitioners are just, "well people who report X, usually have Y. And bacterial vs viral… just a gut feel based on past patients who either responded well to antibiotics or not. Never mind that the vast majority never report back even.
Yup.
