Successful treatment of PTSD by transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) - Clinical validation and treatment access improvements needed

By: Tom Cloyd - 2 min. read (Published: 2013-04-13; reviewed: 2025-04-13:2347 Pacific Time (USA))

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Research-validated effective treatments for posttraumatic stress experiences and disorders don’t work for some individuals. A new, non-invasive TMS (transcranial magnetic stimulation1) treatment has been developed. If ongoing research validates this approach, and it can be made affordable and accessible, it could dramatically change the lives of most of the individuals for whom treatment is inaccessible, intolerable, or ineffective.

Overwhelming posttraumatic emotional (PTE) responses to life events are common - 50 to 70% of the general population will have one or more PTEs in their lifetime.2 That they persist to the point of becoming diagnosable Acute Stress Disorder, is less common. Persistence to the point of becoming posttraumatic disorder is even less common.

Most such cases resolve naturally within a year or less. Treatments have been validated for posttraumatic responses and related disorders and can be used with very significant success as soon as the posttraumatic response is seen, but not everyone has access to them or can tolerate them.

Using precisely targeted TMS, repeated hourly for 10 hours a day, over a period of a week, a single case of severe PTSD appears to have been fully resolved.3 Persistence of results was not known at the time the research was reported, and significant clinical trials remain to be done to learn more about optimal treatment, possible side effects, and applicability to various subpopulations.

READ the detailed mass media report, by one of the studies authors:

Carreon, D.M. (2024, October 25). Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation Therapy | Psychology Today. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/basics/transcranial-magnetic-stimulation-therapy

READ the research report itself: Siddiqi, S. H., Philip, N. S., Palm, S. T., Carreon, D. M., Arulpragasam, A. R., Barredo, J., Bouchard, H., Ferguson, M. A., Grafman, J. H., Morey, R. A., & Fox, M. D. (2024). A potential target for noninvasive neuromodulation of PTSD symptoms derived from focal brain lesions in veterans. Nature Neuroscience, 27(11), 2231–2239. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41593-024-01772-7

References ^

Carreon, D.M. (2024, October 25). Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation Therapy | Psychology Today. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/basics/transcranial-magnetic-stimulation-therapy

Cloyd, T. (2025-04-13). Transcranial magnetic stimulation. Glossary - GettraumaInfo.com. Retrieved from https://www.gettraumainfo.com/pid010-glossary/#TMS.

Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) - National Institute of Mental Health, accessed April 13, 2025, https://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/statistics/post-traumatic-stress-disorder-ptsd

Siddiqi, S. H., Philip, N. S., Palm, S. T., Carreon, D. M., Arulpragasam, A. R., Barredo, J., Bouchard, H., Ferguson, M. A., Grafman, J. H., Morey, R. A., & Fox, M. D. (2024). A potential target for noninvasive neuromodulation of PTSD symptoms derived from focal brain lesions in veterans. Nature Neuroscience, 27(11), 2231–2239. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41593-024-01772-7

Notes ^

  1. Cloyd, T. (2025-04-13). ^

  2. Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) - National Institute of Mental Health ^

  3. Carreon, D.M. (2024) ^

 

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