A programmable and self-adaptive ultrasonic wireless implant for personalized chronic pain management
摘要
Chronic pain management typically involves opioids, which are associated with severe side effects such as addiction. Implantable percutaneous electrical stimulators are a promising alternative approach to pain management. However, they are expensive, can cause damage during surgery and often rely on a battery power supply that must be periodically replaced. Here we report an integrated flexible ultrasound-induced wireless implantable stimulator combined with a pain detection and management system for personalized chronic pain management. Power is supplied to the stimulator by a wearable ultrasound transmitter. We classify pain stimuli from brain recordings by developing a machine learning model and program the acoustic energy from the ultrasound transmitter and therefore the intensity of electrical stimulation. We show that the implant can generate targeted, self-adaptive and quantitative electrical stimulations to the spinal cord according to the classified pain levels for chronic pain management in free-moving animal models.