Vagus Nerve Stimulation and the Immune System

About this episode

This episode discusses the role of the vagus nerve in health and its connection to the immune system, featuring insights from Dr. Kevin Tracey.

The vagus nerve, also known as the Great Nerve, connects the brain to all parts of the body, like an internet (Figure below). Every week we’re learning more about its importance for health and disease. Until recent years the brain and immune system were thought to be in separate “firewalled” compartments. But that turned out to be far from the truth. Dr. Kevin Tracey, who directs the Feinstein Institute at Northwell Health, has been studying the vagus nerve for more than 3 decades. In the early 1990’s he made the seminal observation that stimulating the vagus reduces the inflammatory cytokine known as tumor necrosis factor (TNF), what he described at the time as a “holy s**t” moment. In 2025 he published the book THE GREAT NERVE with many rich patient anecdotes and the history for how this field developed. I wrote about the brain-immune axis previously on Ground Truths , spotlighting the vagus nerve’s role. That included much more on depth of the pathways if you are interested. We discussed the recent FDA July approval for refractory rheumatoid arthritis (RA) (unresponsive to medications or intolerance to medical therapy) based on a sham-controlled randomized trial published in…

People in this episode

Host: Eric Topol

Guest: Dr. Kevin Tracey

Topics covered

• vagus nerve
• immune system
• health
• rheumatoid arthritis
• inflammation

Keywords

• vagus nerve
• immune system
• rheumatoid arthritis
• inflammation
• FDA approval

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: Feinstein Institute, Northwell Health, Nature Medicine

Books & works: THE GREAT NERVE

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