DULUTH — Depression had been an uninvited aspect of Gail Sundstrum’s life since she experienced her first episode of it in 1993.
“I couldn’t stop shaking. I couldn’t stop crying. I couldn’t eat. I couldn’t sleep,” Gail Sundstrom described.
According to the World Health Organization, more than 280 million people worldwide suffer from this disease.
Contributed by Gail Sundstrom
At the time, Gail and her husband, James Sundstrom, had returned to their hometown of Duluth from Las Vegas. At the time, James was struggling to find immediate employment, which worried Gail.
Gail said it was concerning what triggered the major depressive episode that landed her at Essentia Health-Duluth Miller-Dwan for three days.
While the cause of depression is unknown, certain areas of the brain show less activity in people with depression than in people without depression, according to Dr. Nathan Chan, a psychiatrist at Aspirus-St. Luke’s.
Brielle Bredsten / Duluth Media Group
This loss of activity can lead to an imbalance in the brain’s neurotransmitters, which changes the way brain cells send signals to each other, he explained.
According to Chan, untreated depression can also affect a person’s heart or lung function.
“Depression is a complicated illness, both in its treatment and its diagnosis, because it can present itself in so many different ways,” Chan said. “One of the hallmarks I look for in my patients is if they can’t enjoy things the way they normally would.”
After the initial hospitalization, Gail was prescribed Wellbutrin, an antidepressant medication.
“It works, but it takes a while,” he said. “Antidepressants take weeks to kick in.”
It took about a year for her to feel better, but Gail suffered another episode and took about six months to recover.
“Then when the pandemic started, that’s when I started to go downhill again,” she said. “We’re older, so we were supposed to stay home, and it was too much. I was a stay-at-home mom. My husband had retired, but he was doing odd jobs. We had friends; we went out. Suddenly, we couldn’t do any of that anymore.”
Because Gail had underlying medical conditions, James did the shopping and errands for the couple. Cut off from her normal routine, Gail began to feel debilitated by her depression.
“Isolation was terrible,” Gail said. “That was the worst episode I’ve ever experienced.”
Gail had lost the motivation to keep house or do anything other than shake and cry.
Although Gail continued to take the prescribed medication and continued to see her therapist, the treatment had stopped working.
“I would just sit there, staring,” she said. “I had no energy. It really demoralized you.”
According to the independent
Study on alternative sequential treatment to relieve depression
Regarding depression treatments, of more than 4,000 people who participated in the study, 41.4% of patients abandoned treatment due to side effects after four attempts at medication.
Additionally, side effects of antidepressants may include insomnia, headache, migraine, dry mouth, fatigue, weight gain, nausea, gastrointestinal upset, and sexual dysfunction.
After changing the antidepressant she was taking, Gail found that the side effects were worse than the depression.
That’s when Chan recommended Sundstrom try transcranial magnetic stimulation.
Transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) is a noninvasive treatment offered to adult patients with severe depression who have not had success after trying several medications. It is covered by most insurance plans and is approved by the FDA.
Contributed by the National Institute of Mental Health
During a session, a specialized NeuroStar device It sends short bursts of magnetic pulses to specific regions of the brain, generating small electrical currents to stimulate or inhibit activity in the target area.
By selectively stimulating specific brain regions associated with mood regulation, TMS restores balance to brain activity and improves symptoms.
For some patients, the treatment lasts as little as three minutes. Gail began her treatment in the winter and underwent 18-minute sessions for 20 consecutive work days.
Last year, Aspirus St. Luke’s treated 44 patients with TMS. In total, NeuroStar TMS therapy treated a total of 115,000 patients with more than 4.3 million individual treatments.
Side effects of TMS are mild and include temporary discomfort or pain in the scalp, eyes, teeth, face or skin. There is a rare risk of seizures, less than 0.1 percent per patient, so seizure disorders often act as a disqualifying factor for this type of treatment, Chan said.
Brielle Bredsten / Duluth Media Group
“We’re trying to raise awareness about this because it’s a reliable treatment,” Chan said. “My hope is that at some point we’ll use it more as a first-line treatment because it doesn’t have any side effects. It tends to be, on average, more effective than drugs.”
NeuroStar TMS treatment has an 83% response rate, with patients experiencing measurable relief from depression and a 62% complete remission rate of their depression symptoms in the largest depression outcomes registry.
Gail immediately noticed improvement after her first session and feels much more like herself after completing all sessions at Aspirus St. Luke’s Behavioral Health Clinic – Hillside Center, located at 220 N. Sixth Ave. E.
Brielle Bredsten / Duluth Media Group
“Something like transcranial magnetic stimulation seems to give us longer symptom relief than medication on average,” Chan said.
Along with occasional therapy and a low-dose prescription of anti-depression medication, he considers TMS treatment a success.
“I’m not ashamed of my mental illness,” Gail said. “I hope this helps at least one person because let me tell you, going through depression is hell.”
- Minnesota National Alliance on Mental Illness: Statewide **CRISIS Hotline (**274747); 24/7 text line; text MN to 741741
- Arrowhead Regional Crisis Line: Serving Carlton, Cook, Itasca, Koochiching, Lake, and St. Louis counties and the Bois Forte, Fond du Lac, and Grand Portage bands; 24/7 hotline: 844-772-4724
- Aitkin County: Northern Pines Mental Health Center, 800-462-5525
- Itasca County: Itasca County Crisis Response Team, 218-326-8565
- Pine County: Canvas Health, 800-523-3333
- North St. Louis County: Range Mental Health Center, 218-288-2100
- Douglas County, Wisconsin 24-Hour Crisis Line: 715-395-2259
