Hektoen International

A Journal of Medical Humanities

Tag: Neurosurgery

  • Diana Beck, neurosurgery pioneer

    Born in Chester, England, in 1902, Diana Beck attended the University of Oxford and studied medicine at the School of Medicine for Women (later renamed the Royal Free Hospital School of Medicine). She graduated in 1925, and, after working as a surgical registrar, took her FRCS London and Edinburgh. Her exceptional surgical skills led her…

  • Francisco Graña, eminent Peruvian neurosurgeon

    Francisco Graña (1879–1959) was a Peruvian neurosurgeon who once removed a subdural hematoma using 2,000-year-old tools, including a saw of volcanic obsidian glass and a bronze chisel, borrowed from the Peru National Museum of Archaeology. Born into a family of medical professionals, Graña studied medicine at the National University of San Marcos in Lima, graduating…

  • Alexa Canady, MD: The first Black woman neurosurgeon

    Howard FischerUppsala, Sweden “Only a life lived for others is a life worthwhile.”– Albert Einstein Alexa Canady (b. 1950) was the daughter of Clinton Canady, Jr., DDS, and Elizabeth Canady, a civil rights activist and the first African American to serve on the Michigan Board of Education. Alexa’s maternal grandmother taught at Lane College, a…

  • Walter Edward Dandy

    JMS PearceHull, England In the history of American neurosurgery, two names stand out from the rest: Harvey Cushing (1869–1939) and Walter Edward Dandy (1886–1946). Sadly, they were inveterate rivals. Dandy was undoubtedly a brilliant pioneer of both neurosurgical research and practice. He was born in in a small house on 5th Street, Sedalia, Missouri, an…

  • Walter E. Dandy, one of the founders of neurosurgery

    Philip R. LiebsonChicago, Illinois, United States Three pioneers established the discipline of neurosurgery. They were the British surgeon Victor Horsley and the Americans Harvey Cushing and Walter Dandy. Both Americans were surgeons at Johns Hopkins Hospital and Dandy (1886-1946) was the youngest. His innovations include the first clipping of an intracranial aneurysm, the surgical management…

  • Life lessons from death

    Pedro T. LimaRecife, Brazil “How would you like to die?” the professor asked without breaking eye contact. I averted my gaze to ponder the question, but no answers came to mind. “I’ve never thought about it. I guess that I would hope to be with people I love,” I stuttered, still collecting my thoughts. “You…

  • Harvey Cushing and pituitary diseases

    JMS PearceHull, England, UK Of the many aspects and contributions of Harvey Williams Cushing (1869-1939) (Fig 1), this sketch concentrates on his identification of a basophilic tumor of the pituitary with adrenal hyperfunction that he called pituitary basophilism1 (Fig 2). It is now known as Cushing’s disease. Symptoms caused by primary adrenal, iatrogenic, and ectopic…

  • Harvey Cushing: Surgeon, Author, Soldier, Historian 1869-1939

    John RaffenspergerFort Meyers, Florida, United States Harvey Cushing was a third-generation physician, born to a family of New England Puritans who had migrated to Cleveland, Ohio, in the mid 1830s. His father and grandfather were successful physicians; family members on both sides were well-educated and financially secure. At Yale, Cushing studied Latin, Greek, literature, and…

  • Wilder Penfield

    JMS PearceHull, England, United Kingdom Wilder Penfield was not only a great surgeon and a great scientist, he was an even greater human being. -Sir George Pickering, Regius Professor of Medicine at Oxford University Wilder Penfield (1891-1976) (Fig. 1) was the most gifted pioneer of Canadian neurosurgery. He devised effective surgery for controlling intractable epilepsy…

  • William Richard Gowers MD., FRS.

    JMS PearceHull, England The name Gowers is a name hallowed in the minds of most neurologists as one of the great founders of neurological medicine in the Victorian era. He is probably best remembered for his A Manual of Diseases of the Nervous System (1886) (Fig 1.), a rich source of wisdom and clinical description…