Deep Brain Stimulation of the Nucleus Accumbens as a Novel Treatment in Severe Opioid Addiction

Inclusion Criteria: * Age \> 18 years * Proficiency in the German language * Long lasting heroin addiction (fulfilled diagnostic-criteria according to DSM-IV,ICD-10) * At least one detoxication-treatment without a long-term period of abstinence has already taken place * Long-term inpatient treatment to support abstinence have occurred * Free patient's decision / Informed Consent (existing comprehensive ability in meaning, methodology and execution of the study and ability of acceptance) * If prior medication, stable dosage of psychopharmacological drugs over the last three months, which shall, after checking be retained during the study * Substitution treatment with constant dose within the last three months before study inclusion Exclusion Criteria: * Hospitalization by PsychKG * Clinical relevant psychiatric comorbidity (schizophrenic psychoses, bipolar affective diseases, severe personality disorder) * Contraindications of a MRI-examination, e.g. implanted cardiac pacemaker/ heart defibrillator * Current and in the last six months existent paranoid-hallucinated symptomatology * Foreign aggressiveness in the last six months * Verbal IQ \< 85 (evaluated with the German Mehrfachauswahl-Intelligenz-Test (MWT-A/B)) * Stereotactic respectively neurosurgical intervention in the past * Neoplastical neurological diseases * Contraindications of a stereotactic operation, e.g. increased bleeding-disposition, cerebrovascular diseases (e.g. arteriovenous malfunction, aneurysms, systemic vascular diseases) * Serious and instable organic diseases (e.g. instable coronal heart disease) * tested positively for HIV * pregnancy and/or lactation