Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
Review
. 2025 Sep-Oct;18(5):1499-1510.
doi: 10.1016/j.brs.2025.08.004. Epub 2025 Aug 11.

From subthalamic local field potentials to the selection of chronic deep brain stimulation contacts in Parkinson's disease - A systematic review

Marjolein Muller  1 , Mark F C van Leeuwen  2 , Carel F Hoffmann  3 , Niels A van der Gaag  4 , Rodi Zutt  5 , Saskia van der Gaag  5 , Alfred C Schouten  6 , M Fiorella Contarino  7
Affiliations
Free article
Review

From subthalamic local field potentials to the selection of chronic deep brain stimulation contacts in Parkinson's disease - A systematic review

Marjolein Muller et al. Brain Stimul. 2025 Sep-Oct.
Free article

Abstract

Background: Programming deep brain stimulation (DBS) of the subthalamic nucleus for optimal symptom control in Parkinson's Disease (PD) requires time and trained personnel. Novel implantable neurostimulators allow local field potentials (LFP) recording, which could be used to identify the optimal (chronic) stimulation contact. However, literature is inconclusive on which LFP features and prediction techniques are most effective.

Objective: To evaluate the performance of different LFP-based physiomarkers for predicting the optimal (chronic) stimulation contacts.

Methods: A literature search was conducted across nine databases, resulting in 418 individual papers. Two independent reviewers screened the articles based on title, abstract, and full text. The quality of included studies was assessed using a modified Joanna Briggs Institute Critical Appraisal Checklist for Case Series. Results were categorised in four classes based on the predictive performance with respect to the a priori chance.

Results: Twenty-five studies were included. Single-feature beta-band predictions demonstrated positive performance scores in 94 % of the outcomes. Predictions based on single non-beta-frequency features yielded positive scores in only 25 % of the outcomes, with positive results mainly for high frequency oscillations. Multi-feature predictions (e.g. machine learning) achieved accuracy scores within the two highest performance classes more often than single beta-based predictions (100 % versus 39 %).

Conclusion: Predicting the optimal stimulation contact based on LFP recordings is feasible and can improve DBS programming efficiency in PD. Single beta-band predictions show more promising results than non-beta-frequency features alone, but are outperformed by multi-feature predictions. Future research should further explore multi-feature predictions for optimal contact identification.

Keywords: Clinical contact choice; Deep brain stimulation; Local field potentials; Parkinson's disease; Subthalamic nucleus.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

Declaration of competing interest The authors declare the following financial interests/personal relationships which may be considered as potential competing interests: MFC is an independent consultant for research and educational issues of Medtronic (all fees to institution), is an independent consultant for research by INBRAIN (all fees to institution), provides research support/contracted research for Boston Scientific (all fees to institution) and received speaking fees for: ECMT (CME activity), and Boston Scientific (all fees to institution). All other authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper. No other authors have competing interests to declare.

MeSH terms

LinkOut - more resources