I just finished the 1st round and received the activated device. I had no relief with the 1st device, so far I've treated once with the new device and I never got a full blown headache but that just may be a coincidence.

I'm currently in Phase 2 and finding no help from the device, in fact it seemed to trigger a Kip-9 the last time I used it.

Hope you have better results. I was told by the Nurse that Chronics are not doing well with the device.

Don

Quote:


I wonder how hard it would be to take the unit apart and recharge it?

I also suspect that from a design perspective making the battery over a year whilst retaining its charge is more complex than simply using a rechargeable battery. The rechargeable route is simple enough with either the ability to plug the device into a charger (just like I can with my phone, shaver, etc.) or use removeable batteries like my camera, headphones, mouse, tv remotes, etc. that can be either rechargeable batteries or not.

I know that if I was designing such a device then a key design consideration would be for it to be able to use commercial off the shelf batteries such as AA, PP3 or similar that are available worldwide in every kind of shop from supermarkets to petrol stations. I'd not want anyone with CH to ever be in a position that they could not abort a CH due to their battery being flat.

Hi to Mike and all,

Apologies to readers for the overly technical post.
But the device is by nature, technical.

I don't think battery life, or failure is the issue here. A draining or declining battery would create reliability issues with delivery of "doses" if it were to drain below usable voltage and current delivery at all.

From the Electrocore patent sheet:
Quote:


In the clinical trial information on the Gammacore site, "Doses" delivered were 90 second duration and the device delivers 150 of them. At allowable current delivery for such an application, taking into account the total resistivity, required voltage and current drain, I would hardly call that "Heavy duty" battery drain.

An interesting post containing an email to a site user in Oz from an Oz Gammacore rep, back in 2011:

Quote:


The device delivers an exact number of doses - according to David here - 150 of them, which surely means that the device is counting them.

Just like printer ink cartridges, or sometimes printers themselves. I have seen a few printer designs where page counts determine "end of life" in a printer that would otherwise last years. This gave rise to end users hacking EEPROM (Electrically Erasable Programmable Read-Only Memory) chips themselves, which do the memorising, so as to bypass the programmed "end of life" time-span set up my manufacturers.

Multimedia File Viewing and Clickable Links are available for Registered Members only!!  You need to or

From the Electocore parent; US20130131746 A1
See here for drawings, a PDF if you want one and device details:

(Note: The battery is not pictured, nor made reference to in terms of type, rated mAh, expected life, current delivery or voltage)

Multimedia File Viewing and Clickable Links are available for Registered Members only!!  You need to or

From the Electrocore patent paper:
Quote:


I know battery technology has come a long way since 1975, to say the least. I was born that year. Since adulthood I have soldered in hundreds of different and superior batteries for differing end-use-applications, in 20 years of electronics manufacturing.

I would suggest that we are looking at a fairly basic CMOS counter "circuit" and EEPROM that decides for us exactly when our device will reach "throw away" status. From what I can work out, there is no user interface (like a display, readout, or USB port) that allows user reading of the number of doses already delivered. That could leave one in a nasty spot, should one actually find the device "effective" and begin to rely on it...

Given all that, I would say the device design is a quite deliberate and calculated attempt to target a deep-niche market with a product that users will come to "need" and be willing to pay for to replace, lest their CH should return.
IMO, unethical.

As we all know too well here, many a "decision" or "choice" has been made under the duress of severe and chronic CH.

I've been involved in proof-of-concept, manufacturing trial runs and have discussed the ethics and safety of devices made in different industries whilst working with electronics manufacturers.

I sincerely believe that those behind the Electrocore device believe in it's potential to help us. How many of those developers actually have CH, or have used the device?

I would say "let the trials speak for themselves", but the success rates reported anecdotally here and on other forums do not match the reported success rates in trial literature.

It smells fishy to me... battery life in this end-use-application, I suspect, has very little to do with the device becoming unusable. I think it is programmed to end.

Cheers, Ben.

I tried the gamma core  FREE? Trial back in February 2018, just one device for a month. Didn't work for me. Last week, January 2019 they sent a bill to my insurance for $1760.  They denied it of course. Couple hours of phone calls later I think it went away. We'll see. Anyway, there's no way a device like that with a limit on number of uses a month would suffice for me. I get way to many CH.