When her balance issues first started, Mary Pat Mirus thought she was just getting old.
She struggled to pick up her feet, gripped walls for support and wobbled when she walked her dog, a Mi-Ki named Betty White. After years of doctors’ visits with clean scans and no diagnosis, Mirus, 72, resigned herself to never figuring her condition out.
“Everything was an inward look at myself to see what I was doing wrong,” said Mirus, a retired real estate property manager who lives in Park Ridge.
But in June, she was diagnosed with normal pressure hydrocephalus, a neurological condition caused by irregular spinal pressure.
Mirus was identified as a prime candidate for the STRIDE clinical trial that uses an “eShunt” in NPH patients to circulate spinal pressure more regularly. Mirus was the first patient in Illinois to receive the eShunt, and among only a handful of Americans to get one.
Four weeks after her surgery, Mirus was walking with ease.
“It was a miracle to me,” she said.
NPH affects more than 800,000 adults in the U.S., according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and mainly those older than age 65. Trouble walking, memory issues and urinary incontinence are some of the most common symptoms. The condition is said to mimic dementia or Alzheimer’s, which makes it difficult to diagnose.
“You’ve been yourself all your life and then all of a sudden, because of this condition, you start becoming unreliable in a way,” said Dr. Demetrius Lopes, a neurosurgeon and director of cerebrovascular neurosurgery at Advocate Health. He was the first doctor in the state to perform the procedure. “If you have this one chance that you can get more time being independent, I think that’s what we’re going for.”
For 60 years, the treatment for NPH has been to insert a traditional shunt by drilling a burr hole in the skull and charting a path through the brain to improve pressure and circulation of spinal fluid. With the new procedure, an incision is made near the patient’s hip and the eShunt is inserted through a vein. While both procedures are effective, the eShunt is a much less invasive, and involves minimal recovery time and a smaller risk for complications.
The STRIDE clinical trial is part of a larger effort to expand neurological care in the Chicago area. Lopes said it could even lead to other minimally invasive treatments for tumors or gene therapy involving spinal fluid, and he hopes the eShunt will become the standard option if the trial is successful.
Advocate Lutheran General Hospital is located at 1700 Luther Ln. in Park Ridge city on Tuesday, July 29, 2025. Dr. Demetrius Lopes at the hospital’s Center for Advanced Care is among the first neurosurgeons to take part in a clinical trial to treat normal pressure hydrocephalus, a condition that mimics dementia and impacts over 800,000 people in the U.S. | Candace Dane Chambers/Sun-Times
Candace Dane Chambers/Sun-Times
Like most clinical trials, a select number of patients in the STRIDE trial were randomly selected to receive the new eShunt treatment while others receive the traditional shunt. Mirus was selected to receive the treatment. Though the surgery was new and rare, she wasn’t scared. She was willing to try anything.
“When you’re desperate and you see no exit, everything sounds good. Everything sounds perfect,” she said.
Mirus’ surgery was June 24. Two days later, she left the hospital with minimal pain.
“I went into the hospital in a wheelchair,” Mirus said. “I walked out of the hospital.”
When she returned home, her life was completely different.
“I can travel now — I can get on an airplane. I can walk off the airplane. I can go on a road trip,” Mirus said. “There’s nothing I can think of, anything I can’t do.”
Back when Mirus wasn’t improving in physical therapy, she had fallen a few times. She once came to a doctor’s appointment with a bruise on her forehead after falling over while putting Betty White’s water dish down. Her physical therapist suggested she consider moving into an assisted living facility.
Mirus, who lives alone with her dog, wasn’t willing to give up her independence.
“It’s probably the most important factor of living,” Mirus said of her independence. “I think I would have refused [assisted living] … that wasn’t an option for me.”
Neurosurgeon Dr. Demetrius Lopes and patient Mary Patricia Mirus, 72, walk a hallway at Advocate Lutheran General Hospital located at 1700 Luther Ln. in Park Ridge city on Tuesday, July 29, 2025. Dr. Lopes and Mirus are the first in Illinois to take part in a clinical trial to treat normal pressure hydrocephalus, a condition that mimics dementia and impacts over 800,000 people in the U.S. | Candace Dane Chambers/Sun-Times
Candace Dane Chambers/Sun-Times
Mirus said the eShunt changed her life and called the procedure “miraculous.” Lopes hopes it can do the same for other patients.
“It’s extremely groundbreaking, not only on the treatment of NPH but also the procedure is opening a new window in our field,” Lopes said.
The STRIDE trial is ongoing and anyone who thinks they may qualify can visit the Advocate website.