The Imperative of Psychiatric Neurosurgery

Editorial Neurosurgery for psychiatric disorders

Daring must be an inborn trait. Egas Moniz, the neurolo-gist who extrapolated from the abolition of experimental neurosis in two chimpanzees to the invention of a procedure to ablate pathways of the frontal lobes in mentally ill human beings, had already developed angiog-raphy and spent time in jail for opposition to the Portugese monarchy 1. Such a man could write, in recording the results in ...

Functional Neurosurgery in Psychiatric Illnesses

Advances in the treatment of psychiatric illnesses have made it possible to use neuropharmacological drugs, in many instances, thus diminishing the need for somatic type of invasive treatment. However there still remains a core of patients with psychiatric illnesses for whom continued attempts at treatment with psychotherapy and drugs have not yielded good results. Such cases deserve considerat...

Lesion procedures in psychiatric neurosurgery.

OBJECTIVE Lesion procedures for psychiatric indications have a history that spans more than a century. This review provides a brief history of psychiatric surgery and addresses the most recent literature on lesion surgery for the treatment of anxiety and mood disorders. METHODS Relevant data described in publications from the early 1900 s through the modern era regarding lesion procedures for...

Editorial Neurosurgery for psychiatric disorders

TOPIC REVIEW Modern Neurosurgery for Psychiatric Disorders

OBJECTIVE: The evolution, rationale, and results of modern functional neurosurgery to treat psychiatric disorders are documented. The potential benefits of neurosurgical treatment for selected, critically ill, psychiatric patients are considered. METHODS: The history, anatomic features, and evolution of and contemporary indications for the four currently used procedures (cingulotomy, subcaudate...