DEBRIS.COMgood for a laugh, or possibly an aneurysm

OK, so this is the most gruesome thing I’ve read all day:

The infamous transorbital lobotomy was a “blind” operation in that the surgeon did not know for certain if he had severed the nerves or not. A sharp, ice-pick like object would be inserted through the eye socket between the upper lid and eye. When the doctor thought he was at about the right spot, he would hit the end of the instrument with a hammer.

The lobotomy is in the news this week; the LA Times interviews a lobotomy survivor in Psyche’s Torn Curtain: Now seen as misguided butchery, lobotomies were once the treatment of choice for mental illness. Doctors, patients confront a dark past. (local mirror)

He was 12 when a “psychosurgeon” hammered ice picks into his eye sockets. His parents took him to the hospital “for testing;” he woke up with a “massive headache,” spent 5 days in the hospital, vomiting, and only later found out what had happened. He appears to have been a troubled kid, but the treatment does not fit the disease. Then again, I don’t have a medical degree, so I’m not really qualified to say when hammering ice picks into people’s brains is an appropriate course of treatment.

The history of the procedure is interesting, in that it went from cutting-edge to mainstream to butchery in 40 years. I wonder what trends of present-day society will be viewed as misguided or, at the extreme, horrific, 40 years from now: LASIK? Low-carb diets? Celebrity? Earth-trashing, gas-guzzling personal armored vehicles masquerading as passenger cars?

Speaking of vehicles of destruction, don’t miss the story about Dr. Walter Freeman’s “lobotomobile.” What a unique co-marketing opportunity for Hummer — were Freeman alive today, Hummer could sponsor his mobile brain-damage operation. Freeman could perform the procedure in the back seat while making a run for groceries or dropping his kids off at soccer practice. But I guess Hummer isn’t hurting for endorsers.