Essential tremor affects the arms and hands, but can also affect the head, face, jaw, tongue and feet. The disorder gradually worsens over time, and at its most severe can be disabling and make daily activities extremely difficult, according to the NHS.
When patients reach this stage, they may be offered two types of surgery: a thalamotomy or deep brain stimulation - the latter which Elishuv underwent.
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Before the operation, she said her "greatest love" was playing the violin, adding it was "very difficult" to stop performing professionally and instead work as a teacher when she was "used to playing her entire life."
"Now I can start living again," Elishuv told reporters after surgeons at the Tel Aviv Sourasky Medical Centre completed the operation.
"It's too bad I only heard of the operation now,"she added.
"I can't wait to resume normal life. I want to play, to sign a paper, to drink tea without spilling it,"Elishuv said before entering surgery, Israeli daily newspaper Haaretz reported.
Professor Yitzhak Fried, the hospital's director of Functional Neurosurgery, who operated on Elishuv on Tuesday morning, told the newspaper that he cured Elishuv by implanting a brain pacemaker with electrodes into the area causing the tremor.
Through a minute hole in Elishuv skull, the team operated on her brain and implanted a 1.3millimetre electrode into the thalamus region of her brain. In the second phase, the exact part of the brain causing the tremor was stimulated with electricity.
"The operation was performed under local anaesthesia. In order to place the electrode in the optimal location, we wanted her active participation in real-time, so we asked Elishuv to play the violin during the surgery. During the procedure, she did not feel pain because these areas of the brain do not feel pain," he said.
- Independent
