People with Parkinson’s disease might find relief through a new deep-brain stimulation technique that doesn’t require surgery, a new study says.
One of the most effective treatments for advanced Parkinson’s involves surgery to implant electrodes into the brain, which deliver electrical pulses to stimulate brain regions.
But researchers now are developing a technique that could apply the same stimulation from outside the skull, with no need for brain surgery, researchers reported in the May issue of the journal eBioMedicine.
The approach, called transcranial temporal interference stimulation (TIs), uses overlapping electrical currents to selectively target deep brain regions.
A small group of patients experienced significantly improved movement following TIs, compared to treatment with sham therapy, researchers said.
“TIs represents a fundamentally different approach to non-invasive neuromodulation — one that can reach deep brain targets without surgery,” researcher Dr. Alvaro Pascual-Leone said in a news release. Pascual-Leone is medical director of the Deanna and Sidney Wolk Center for Memory Health at Hebrew SeniorLife in Boston.
Parkinson’s disease causes tremors, stiffness, slowed motion, walking problems, and difficulty with balance and coordination, according to the Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson’s Research.
To test the new approach, researchers applied TIs to 30 people with early- to mid-stage
Parkinson’s in a single 20-minute session that stimulated the subthalamic region – a key node in the brain’s motor control network.
About 70 percent of the patients experienced clinically meaningful improvement after their Tis session, researchers said.
By comparison, only 15 percent of the same people experienced improvement after they were given a fake session.
Symptoms involving tremors or slowness of movement responded the most from the brain stimulation, researchers said. Rigidity and balance problems less consistently improved.
The stimulation also proved safe, with no serious adverse events reported. Patients reported mild sensations like tingling or warmth at about the same rate during either the real or fake treatment sessions.
Researchers plan to conduct larger studies applying multiple sessions of stimulation to see how long these benefits last, how treatments should be spaced, and which patients are most likely to respond.
“One of the most promising aspects of this work is the ability to individualize stimulation based on each patient’s own brain anatomy. That level of precision could become increasingly important as we learn how to tailor neuromodulation therapies to different Parkinson’s symptoms and different patients,” said researcher Brad Manor, a senior scientist at the Hinda and Arthur Marcus Institute for Aging Research at Hebrew SeniorLife in Boston.
“A noninvasive technique like TIs could someday provide a valuable new option either before surgery is considered or alongside existing therapies,” Manor said in a news release.
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Parkinson’s disease is often underrecognized in Black communities, even though Black Americans can and do develop the condition. Black patients are more likely to be diagnosed later in the disease process and are less likely to receive care from movement disorder specialists or access advanced therapies.
That makes research into less-invasive treatment especially important. Current advanced Parkinson’s treatments, like deep brain stimulation (DBS), typically require brain surgery and ongoing specialty care — options that may not be accessible or appealing to every patient. A non-surgical alternative could eventually help reduce some of those barriers while expanding treatment options for people who have historically been underserved in neurological care.
The findings also highlight the broader need for more inclusive Parkinson’s research. Black patients remain underrepresented in many neurological studies, which can make it harder to fully understand how emerging treatments work across diverse populations.
Black patients may face delayed diagnoses, limited access to movement disorder specialists, and barriers to advanced treatments due to cost, transportation, insurance, and healthcare inequities. Some patients may also feel hesitant about invasive procedures like brain surgery, making less-invasive treatment options especially important.
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Because this treatment doesn’t require surgery or implanted devices, researchers believe it could eventually make advanced Parkinson’s treatment more accessible. If proven effective, noninvasive therapies may help reduce some of the barriers patients face when seeking specialized neurological care.
Researchers say larger studies are needed to confirm the treatment’s long-term safety and effectiveness. For now, the therapy remains experimental, but experts hope it could eventually become another option for managing Parkinson’s symptoms without surgery.
More information
The Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson’s Research has more on deep brain stimulation for Parkinson’s.
SOURCE: Hebrew SeniorLife Hinda and Arthur Marcus Institute for Aging Research, news release, May 11, 2026
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