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(#6) Joe Kennedy Had A Lobotomy Performed On His Daughter Rosemary, Because She Was A Potential Embarrassment To The Family
Rosemary Kennedy was the third child born to Joseph Sr. and Rose Kennedy. She was the younger sister of former President John F. Kennedy, and, due to a possible brain injury that she received at birth (a nurse reportedly held her in the birth canal for two hours while waiting for a doctor to arrive), Rosemary was the mentally slowest person in the entire family. This seemed fine when she was a child, but once she became an adult, her outbursts led her father to seek treatments.
Rosemary's sister, Kathleen, looked into the newest treatment at the time - the lobotomy. She rejected it as an option, but Joseph Sr. secretly took Rosemary to have it performed. It had drastic consequences, leaving her unable to walk properly or speak properly. As a result, she spent the rest of her life hidden away in a residential care facility and her plight inspired one of her sisters, Eunice, to create the Special Olympics.
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(#7) Mentally Ill WWII Veterans Were Given Lobotomies To Treat What Is Now Known As PTSD
According to records found in the National Archives, nearly 2,000 World War II veterans received lobotomies. The lobotomies were performed on vets who had been diagnosed with depression, schizophrenia, and psychosis - all of which have symptoms overlapping with what is now known as PTSD. In some cases, war veterans received the lobotomies against their will, and for the most part, they were left with serious problems, such as seizures, the loss of motor skills, and even amnesia.
While it was a success for some of the men, the fact that the US Department of Veteran's Affairs didn't save any of the records in their current files and downplays the lobotomies, shows that weren't proud of having forced the procedure on the men whose wellbeing they were in charge of.
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(#2) Moniz, An Argentinean Neurologist, Was Awarded A Nobel Prize For Inventing The Procedure, Which Was Then Known As A "Leucotomy"
In the 1920s and '30s, a neurologist in Argentina named Antonio Egas Moniz fine-tuned a procedure that he called a leucotomy. It involved drilling holes in the front sections of the skull, then inserting a metal implement with a wire attached to demolish segments of the tissue in the frontal lobe of the brain. After this was completed, he poured a small amount of absolute alcohol into that part of the brain to kill any remaining live tissue.
His procedure was reportedly so successful (or so people believed at the time) that Moniz was awarded a Nobel Prize in Medicine in 1949.
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(#12) It Is Still Practiced In Some Countries To Curb Violent Behavior
Most of North America and Europe view the lobotomy as an archaic and barbaric procedure. However, some countries still practice it in the 21st century. These lobotomies are reserved for the most violent patients in India, Japan, Sweden, and Australia.
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(#13) Actor Warner Baxter Received A Lobotomy To Help With His Arthritis Pain
Warner Baxter was a silent film star who was in movies like 42nd Street and The Cisco Kid. His career slowed down when films were no longer silent, but not because he didn't have the voice for it. Instead, he suffered from chronic pain and arthritis, which hampered his ability to function well while on set. The pain was so bad that he stopped eating properly.
The doctors decided to give him a lobotomy during his second hospitalization in the hope of lessening his pain. Whether or not the procedure worked is still uncertain, as Baxter developed pneumonia shortly afterwards and died in 1951 at the age of 62.
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(#10) The Lobotomy Turned Some Patients Into "Living Zombies"
In some cases, when it was done carefully, the lobotomy helped patients. However, most of the time, it had drastic consequences that resulted in patients becoming zombie-like versions of themselves. There are many stories of former lobotomy patients not being able to walk, talk, or even perform simple tasks after the procedure. Others were left feeling apathetic, forgetful, unreactive, or even careless.
While it did take away the violent tendencies of the mentally ill, it did so at a great cost.
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About This Tool
Lobotomy is neurosurgery that removes the connecting tissue of the prefrontal cortex of the brain. It was mainly used to treat some mental illnesses from 1930 to 1950. It was also the world's first psychiatric surgery. The recognized inventor of lobectomy won the Nobel Prize in Physiology and Medicine. However, less than a year later, Antonio Moniz was criticized, and the lobectomy began to be resisted worldwide.
Due to the low precision of the operation performed on the brain under crude conditions, and surgical patients had symptoms similar to dementia and mental retardation after the operation. The random tool explains 14 things about the crude surgical procedure of early lobotomy.
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