If I Only Had a Brain

1
If I Only Had a Brain

• A brief study of lobotomies by Chris Watkins
• December 11, 2001

2
What Is a Lobotomy?

• Websters Dictionary defines a lobotomy as the
  severance of nerve fibers (as of the frontal
  lobes) by incision into the brain for the relief
  of some mental disorders and tensions.
• In Laymen's terms, a lobotomy is a type of brain
  surgery that lacerates certain brain tissue in
  order to obtain a calmer, more manageable patient.

3
What Were They Used For?

• Schizophrenia
• Depression
• Bipolar
• Radical Violent Behavior
• Eating Disorders
• And anything else that institutional doctors
  could not treat with conventional means

4
Where Did This Procedure Come From?

• The roots of lobotomies can be traced back to the
  late 19th century with the German Scientist,
  Friederich Golzs experiments on dogs. Golz
  theorized that he could make the animals less
  aggressive by ablating the neocortex of the
  brain. His experiments on dogs did achieve
  limited success a few of the puppies died
  shortly thereafter.

5
After The Dogs

• A Swedish insane asylum supervisor heard of
  Golzs success with dogs, and in 1892 Gottlieb
  Burkhardt attempted the same procedure on six of
  his schizophrenic patients. Two of the six died,
  and results for the others were inconclusive.
  Because of Golzs results, attempts to use
  lobotomies on people were abandoned. At least for
  a while

• Several years later (1935) scientists in the
  United States, Carlyle Jacobsen and John Fulton,
  collaborated for experiments on the prefrontal
  cortexes of chimpanzees. Their results became the
  foundations for the lobotomy movement in the
  United States.

6
And After The Chimps?

• A Portuguese neuropsychiatrist, Antonio Egas
  Moniz, inspired by Fulton and Jacobsens results,
  developed a new technique to alleviate some
  psychological disorders. Moniz (pictured to the
  right) felt that disconnecting the cortex to the
  thalamus would interrupt repetitive thoughts
  (which he felt were the cause of many ailments)
  would have the desired effect on people.

7
And after Moniz?

• After Moniz published his results, American
  doctor Walter Freeman (left) adopted his
  technique. Freeman recruited neurosurgeon James
  Watts. After gaining confidence in their
  technique (through trial and error), they widely
  publicized their works. Despite resistance of
  many scientists, their procedure started to gain
  popularity.

8
Then What Happened?

• Lobotomies were gaining acceptance and
  popularity, but there was still one problem.
  Monizs procedure was very ghastly and difficult.
  So, Freeman developed the ice-pick lobotomy.
  This new technique used a tool very similar to a
  household ice-pick. The tool was inserted above
  the eye, through the skull and brain tissue into
  the prefrontal lobe. Once inserted, the tool
  would then be swung in order to sever the
  surrounding tissue. The procedure as a whole was
  incredibly simply and took only a matter of
  minutes.

9
A Lobotomy Epidemic

• Lobotomies took America by storm. Because of the
  ease of the procedure, it became very widespread.
  Unfortunately, lobotomies were often performed
  not in order to cure an ailment, but instead to
  simply control the patient. At the end of World
  War II, the use of lobotomies continued to surge
  as the procedure was used to treat soldiers with
  post-war trauma. The acceptability of lobotomies
  continued to grow when Moniz won the Nobel Prize
  in 1949 for his developments in neurosurgery.
  This resulted in lobotomies being accepted as a
  legitimate procedure. It has been estimated that
  more lobotomies were done three years following
  the Nobel Prize than in all previous year.

10
Famous Victims of the Lobotomy Epidemic

• Actress Francis Farmer
• Rosemary Kennedy, sister of President John F.
  Kennedy.
• Rose Williams, sister of famed writer Tennessee
  Williams.

11
Lobotomies In The Media

• After the Lobotomy Epidemic, the procedure found
  its way into the media. Two works that portrayed
  lobotomies as horrible tools of repression were
  Suddenly Last Summer, by Tennessee Williams (most
  likely in remembrance of his sister) and One Flew
  Over the Cuckoos Nest by Ken Casey.

12
So, the Lobotomy Epidemic Ended?

• Yes, the lobotomy epidemic came to a sudden halt
  in the early 1950s. While their popularity was
  growing (Monizs Nobel Prize), so was their
  resistance. Other doctors were seeing the
  undesired effects more often than the desired
  ones. A rough statistic says that only one third
  of the patients improved, one third stayed the
  same, and one thirds condition worsened. Many
  people also had ethical objections to the
  irreversible damage that a lobotomy caused to the
  brain. In addition to the effects of lobotomies
  being a cause of their own demise, other drugs
  were also developed (Thorazine) that combated
  depression and other illness more effectively.

13
Lobotomies Today

• Now, lobotomies are hardly ever used. In the
  United States, laws were developed in the 1970s
  restrict the use of such procedures.
• Lobotomies are still occasionally used around the
  world. Countries such as Japan, Australia, and
  Sweden are the most common lands for the
  operation today. The use of lobotomies in those
  countries is still very,very rare.

14
Works Cited

• Boeree. A Brief History of the Lobotomy.
  http//www.ship.edu/cgboeree/lobotomy.html
• Cassell, Larocca. The Encyclopedia of Obesity
  Eating Disorders. FactsOnFile Publishing New
  York, New York. 1994
• Lobotomy Information-History. http//www.psychosur
  gery.org/history.html
• Sabbatini. The History of Lobotomy.
  http//www.epuh.org.br/cm/n02/historia/lobotomy.ht
  m
• Scwartz, Lillehei, Shires, Spencer, Storer.
  Principles of Surgery, Second Edition.
  McGraw-Hill Book Company New York, New York.
  1974