What is a lobotomy is it some type of surgical procedure?
Answers:
It is the removal or destruction of all or part of the frontal lobe of the brain; it is a controversial surgical procedure that was done to "treat" a mixture of psychological disorders, but since around the 1950s and especially after the introduction of effective pharmaceutical treatments for those disorders (which actually work), it is no longer performed (since it really does more mar than good), except in very unusual circumstances.
A lobotomy is a surgical procedure in which quantity of the brain is removed. Popularized by Egad Moniz, a neurosurgeon, it was used to treat schizophrenia in the 1940s (thereabouts). Sure enough, removing section of the brain decreased psychotic and often dangerous behavior but also disappeared patients emotionally flat. It was a barbaric procedure that was refined so that it could be perform with an ice-pick like instrument as an outpatient procedure. Mostly frontal and some temporal lobe areas were removed. As I take out about 50,000 people were lobotomized surrounded by hospitals in the US and Europe. The wild hallucinations, delusion, agitation and other behaviors often seen were replaced beside placid, flat, walking vegetables. Remarkably, Moniz actually won the Nobel prize in Medicine for this work! Fortunately, by the 1950s anti-psychotic medications be relatively effective in treating many schizophrenics and the medical pasture woke up from this nightmare. No one performs these surgeries today. Source(s): I am a forensic psychopharmacologist trained in psychology and neuroscience, author of several texts, and qualified neuropharmacology for many years.
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