What Is an Anterior Resection?

Frontal lobe resection is English for lobotomy. Each hemisphere of the brain is divided into four lobes, the frontal lobe is the largest one, accounting for about 1/3 of the volume. After removal, people will lose many functions, including a large part of their personality. It's almost a walking dead, the only thing that is the same as normal people is that they can breathe.

Frontal resection

Frontal lobe resection is English for lobotomy.

Right: James Watts (left) and Walter Freeman are doing

Freeman seemed to find Moniz's technique a bit mediocre, so he started experimenting with an outpatient treatment, using

Frontal resection is no longer used for the treatment of mental illness. The rise of drugs like chlorpromazine hydrochloride has made chemical excision of the frontal lobe more feasible-the troublesome ice cone method is no longer available. Although many doctors have protested that these psychiatric drugs are the same as previous frontal resections, the reasons for using them are the same as they were 70 years ago. Patients often seem happier and more calm. Not to mention they also cause less trouble for families and caregivers.

However, a "lobectomy" similar to frontal resection is on the rise. This is because the surgery is indeed an effective way to treat extreme epilepsy or other illnesses. Seizures can cause irreversible brain damage, so it is generally considered better to cut off the connection between the two hemispheres so that epilepsy no longer occurs.

This is the original appearance of lobectomy. An article published in the New England Journal of Medicine pointed out that the researchers randomly extracted and controlled cases from a group of patients' surgical data disclosed as a result of the lawsuit. In the case, surgery was indeed the best treatment.

Unlike Freeman's "perforation" method, these procedures are performed in a very precise manner. Surgery may change the personality of patients slightly, but they can return to normal life and are more likely to survive epilepsy without brain damage.

At this point, from a horrible medical practice, we have at least got a good treatment, which also reminds us that the Nobel Prize therapy of one generation may be the scariest nightmare of another generation.