Neuropsychological outcome after deep brain stimulation in the ventral capsule/ventral striatum for highly refractory obsessive-compulsive disorder or major depression.

Background: Deep brain stimulation (DBS) has shown promise as a treatment for severe, highly treatment-refractory obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) or major depressive disorder (MDD). We describe the neuropsychological outcome in 21 patients (10 OCD and 11 MDD) who received DBS in the anterior limb of the internal capsule/ventral striatum (VC/VS).

Methods: All patients completed a preoperative and postoperative neuropsychological battery. Average duration of DBS stimulation was 8.91 months (SD = 4.63) at the time of follow-up testing. Data were analyzed using practice-effect-corrected change scores.

Results: No significant cognitive declines were seen. There were significant improvements in prose passage recall after chronic DBS. The cognitive improvements were not related to change in severity of OCD, depression or global impairment.

Conclusions: This preliminary study suggests that VC/VS DBS does not result in cognitive declines. The observations that verbal memory improved are consistent with current theories on the role of the VS in the memory, but require replication in larger studies.