At the Heart of the Brain

Client:

New England Medical Center

Audience:

Friends of the hospital

Goal:

Capture both the human and the technical side of an exciting new medical story: the use of balloon angioplasty to repair brain aneurysms

Role:

Writing

Deep in the heart of the brain is a region neurosurgeons once considered a no-man's land. They could not see it. They could not reach it without causing damage as potentially devastating as the lesions they sought to treat. As recently as five or ten years ago, they often could not help patients with tumors or blood clots, ruptured blood vessels or cysts, there, at the heart of the brain.

But new technologies are providing neurosurgeons and neuroradiologists with the equivalent of X-ray vision. These technologies produce images of the brain that guide treatment of formerly untreatable lesions. At New England Medical Center, where clinicians are pioneering some of the new procedures, patients who thought it impossible are getting a second chance at living normal lives.