Lobotomies Pt. 1

In 18th century England, Mary Toft defied all medical odds when she started giving birth to rabbits. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices 

In 18th century England, Mary Toft defied all medical odds when she started giving birth to rabbits. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices 

Neurologist Walter Freeman was a top doctor in his field. He was on the cutting edge of brain surgery, even going so far as to develop a new procedure called the 'lobotomy'. Unfortunately, it became one of the deadliest medical techniques of the 20th century. Learn more about you ...  Show more

In 1949, neurologist Egas Moniz reached the pinnacle of his career when he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Medicine. He received this honor for what is now known as a lobotomy, though at the time it was referred to as leucotomy, "for its therapeutic value in certain psychoses." T ...  Show more

When Portuguese neurologist Egas Moniz developed the lobotomy in 1935, it was little more than a crude surgery developed as a blanket treatment for mental illness that involved drilling into the skull and scrambling the neural connections in the frontal lobe. Less than a decad ...

American neurologist Walter Jackson Freeman had refined Moniz’s procedure and developed a non-surgical procedure that could be performed in a doctor’s office, which he called a transorbital lobotomy.

Freeman’s procedure involved inserting a medical instrument similar to ...