My husband had DBS surgery in June and his PD has progressed quite quickly since that procedure. His speech is slurred and he is hard to understand. His balance has gotten progressively worse too.
My husband's doctor has mentioned putting in another lead in addition to the 3 he has. Do you know anyone that has had it done? It seems a little scary to me.
Yes. my husband had DBS surgery in 2012 and now his speech is extremely compromised. It is an unfortunate trade-off, tremors or speech. The DBS was a blessing, as the tremors were out of control and meds were no longer effective, but the loss of speech is heartbreaking. I think speech therapy early-on following DBS surgery is helpful.
I am faced with the same problem
My husband had DBS about 12 years ago. The speech has declined to the point we can not communicate 99% of the time a d that is the most frustrating thing we have encountered.
DBS has not controlled my husband's tremors as much as we had hoped.
Yes, unfortunately my husband's speech has progressively deteriorated since his DBS surgery. It is a difficult trade off...increasing tremors or increasingly poor speech. When the DBS is turned off the tremors are impossible, he had pretty much maxed out on the oral meds to control tremors so DBS was necessary. DBS certainly is not an answer to PD issues, but it has been a God-send for the tremors.