A new form of brain stimulation relieved severe depression in a small study
Either this will win the Nobel Prize, or it won't hold up. (Guess which one is more likely.)<p>A few reasons I don't think it will hold up:
- this is a university press release
- N = 21
- no control group
- no blinding
- university press release doesn't even claim it's a new approach, just incremental improvement on an existing approach
- the paper (link below) is about evaluating safety, feasibility, and "preliminary efficacy" (i.e., they're not advertising this as a robust result)<p>Paper available here:<p><a href="https://ajp.psychiatryonline.org/doi/10.1176/appi.ajp.2019.19070720" rel="nofollow">https://ajp.psychiatryonline.org/doi/10.1176/appi.ajp.2019.1...</a><p><a href="https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/581280v3.full" rel="nofollow">https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/581280v3.full</a>