Case Study: Lahey Clinic achieves predictive 3D scar-effect models to restore spinal cord stimulation performance with COMSOL Multiphysics

Lahey Clinic - Customer Case Study

Lahey Clinic’s Neuromodulation Group (Jeffrey Arle, Jay Shils, Kris Carlson) faced a clinical and engineering challenge: scar tissue that forms around implanted spinal cord stimulation (SCS) electrodes alters local impedance and distorts electric fields, forcing clinicians to reprogram devices by slow trial-and-error. To understand and predict these changes, the team turned to Comsol Multiphysics to model how scar formation and tissue conductivities affect stimulation of spinal axons.

Using SolidWorks geometry imported into Comsol, the group built a high‑fidelity 3‑D finite‑element model of the spinal cord, dura, CSF, scar tissue and electrodes, evaluating hundreds of scar/electrode scenarios (432 modeled configurations) and exporting activation results into their neural-circuitry simulator. Comsol’s simulations made the field distortions explicit, enabling targeted reprogramming that produced immediate pain relief when on target, reduced trial-and-error programming, and provided quantitative guidance for clinicians.

Lahey Clinic

Jeffrey Arle

Lahey Clinic