Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-dk4vv Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-22T17:28:07.180Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Bi-Frontal Stereotactic Tractotomy

A follow-up study of its effects on 210 patients

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 January 2018

Rolf Ström-Olsen  and
Sheila Carlisle
Rolf Ström-Olsen
Affiliation:
Neurosurgical Unit, Brook General Hospital, London, S.E.18; Runwell Hospital, Essex
Sheila Carlisle
Affiliation:
Brook General Hospital
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

Since 1955 there has been a steady decline in the number of leucotomy operations, particularly of the open standard type introduced into this country in 1941. It has been considered by most authors that the undesirable side-effects caused this decline but no doubt the introduction of ataractic drugs also played its part (Pippard, 1962). Sykes and Tredgold (1964) discussed in detail the literature up to that time and it was felt unnecessary to repeat that survey here. Suffice it to say that from about 1949 various modifications of the standard operation were devised in the hope of diminishing or eliminating undesirable sequelae. Following the publication of a paper on the late social results of pre-frontal leucotomy by Ström-Olsen and Tow (1949) the late Alexander Kennedy (1949) wrote in the correspondence column of the Lancet—‘The future of this kind of operation (i.e. standard leucotomy) lies in limited and accurately localized sections. The correlation of these with their clinical and neuropathological effects offers a field of study which will occupy us for many years to come’.

Type
Research Article
Information
The British Journal of Psychiatry , Volume 118 , Issue 543 , February 1971 , pp. 141 - 154
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal College of Psychiatrists, 1971 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Grantham, E. G., and Spurling, R. G. (1953). ‘Selective lobotomy in the treatment of intractable pain.’ Annals of Surgery, 137, 602–8.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Herner, T. (1961). ‘Treatment of mental disorders with frontal stereotaxic thermo-lesions.’ Acta Psychiatrica Supplement 158, 140 pp.Google Scholar
Kelly, D. H. W., Walter, C. J. S., and Sargant, W. (1966): ‘Modified leucotomy assessed by forearm blood flow and other measurements.’ British Journal of Psychiatry, 112, 871–81.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Kennedy, A. (1949). Correspondence. Lancet, i, 242.Google Scholar
Knight, G. C. (1964). ‘The orbital cortex as an objective in the surgical treatment of mental illness. The development of the stereotactic approach.’ British Journal of Surgery, 51, 114–24.Google ScholarPubMed
Knight, G. C. (1965). ‘Stereotactic tractotomy in the surgical treatment of mental illness.’ Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery and Psychiatry, 28, 304–10.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Knight, G. C. (1969). ‘Stereotactic surgery for the relief of suicidal and severe depression and intractable psychoneurosis.’ (21st Alex Simpson-Smith Memorial Lecture.) Postgraduate Medical Journal, 45, 1–13.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Knight, G. C. (1969). ‘Bi-frontal stereotactic tractotomy.’ British Journal of Psychiatry, 115, 257–66.Google ScholarPubMed
Knight, G. C., and Tredgold, R. F. (1955). ‘Orbital leucotomy— a review of 52 cases.’ Lancet, i, 981–5.Google Scholar
Leksell, L. (1949). ‘A stereotaxic apparatus for intracerebral surgery.’ Acta Chirurgica Scandinavica, 99, 229–33.Google Scholar
Leksell, L. (1957). ‘Gezielte Hirn Operationen’ in 'Handbuch der Neurochirurgie, edited by Olivecrona, H. and Tönnis, W. Berlin—Göttingen—Heidelberg VI, 178–99.Google Scholar
Lewis, A. (1935) Proceedings of the Royal Society of Medicine, 29, 325.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Liddell, D. W., and Retterstöl, N. (1957). ‘The occurrence of epileptic fits in leucotomised patients receiving chlorpromazine therapy.’ Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery and Psychiatry, 20, 105–7.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lindström, P. A. (1954). ‘Prefrontal ultrasonic radiation —a substitute for lobotomy.’ Archives of Neurology, 72, 399–425.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Lomas, J., Boardman, R. H., and Markowe, M. (1955). ‘Complications of chlorpromazine therapy in 800 mental hospital patients.’ Lancet, i, 144–7.Google Scholar
Marks, I. M., Birley, J. L. T., and Gelder, M. G. (1966). ‘Modified leucotomy in severe agoraphobia. A controlled serial inquiry.’ British Journal of Psychiatry, 112, 757–69.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Merlis, S. (1955). In Chlorpromazine and Mental Health, Proceedings of symposium held under auspices of Smith, Kline and French Laboratories—Kempton, Philadelphia and London. 60.Google Scholar
Pippard, J. (1955). ‘Personality changes after a rostral leucotomy: a comparison with standard prefrontal leucotomy.’ Journal of Mental Science, 101, 774–87.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Pippard, J. (1962). ‘Leucotomy in Britain today.’ Journal of Mental Science, 108, 249–55.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Post, F., Rees, W. L., and Schurr, P. H. (1968). ‘An evaluation of bimedial leucotomy.’ British Journal of Psychiatry, 114, 1223–46.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Scoville, W. B. (1949). ‘Orbital cortex undercutting.’ Journal of Neurosurgery, 6, 65–9.Google Scholar
Spiegel, E. A., Wycis, H. T., Marks, M., and Lee, A. J. (1947). ‘Stereotaxic apparatus for operations in the human brain.’ Science, 106, 349–50.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Spiegel, E. A., Wycis, H. T., Freed, H., and Orchinik, C. (1956). ‘A follow-up study of patients treated by thalamotomy and by combined frontal and thalmic lesions.’ Journal of Nervous and Mental Diseases, 124, 399–404.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ström-Olsen, R. (1946) ‘Prefrontal leucotomy, with reference to indications and results.’ Proceedings of the Royal Society of Medicine, 39, 443–4.Google Scholar
Ström-Olsen, R., and Tow, P. M. (1949). ‘Late social results of prefrontal leucotomy.’ Lancet, i, 87–90.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ström-Olsen, R., and Northfield, D. W. C. (1955). ‘Orbital cortex undercutting.’ Lancet, ii 986–91.Google Scholar
Sykes, M. K., and Tredgold, R. F. (1964). ‘Restricted orbital undercutting. A study of its effects on 350 patients over the ten years 1951–1960.’ British Journal of Psychiatry, 110, 609–40.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Tooth, G. C., and Newton, M. P. (1961). Leucotomy in England and Wales 1942–1954. London: HMSO.Google Scholar
Tow, P. M., and Lewin, W. (1953). ‘Orbital leucotomy.’ Lancet, i, 644–9.Google Scholar
Submit a response

eLetters

No eLetters have been published for this article.