MODERN MIRACL'S.

Otaki Mail, 10 January 1923, Page 4

MODERN MIRACL'S.

OPERATIONS THAT CORE CRIMINALS. In his recent presidential address to the British Medical Association, Sir Wiliam MacEwun told of an operation performed by hiuiself on a man suffering from an abscess on the brain. ’the patient collapsed and artificial respiration had to be curried on while the brain was” opened and the pus reluoved. Suddenly the man, who for long minutes had been trembling on the brink of the grave, woke up. ‘‘What’s all this fuss about?” he remarked pettishly. ,

Operations ou the brain will make the blind to see, the lame to walk and will restore other lost faculties. Timo was, and nut so long ago, when a bullet in the bruin meant certain death. To-day there arc scores of men, alive and well, who have been shot through tho head. A certain man was suffering from brain disease, and X-ray examination

showed that a portion of the brain was actually decayed. The patient was in a state of “coma.” Tho, doctor in charge of the case decided to procure the bruin of another patient and transplant a portion of it to rcxilace the diseased portion. That day a child born in one of the hospital wards died. Its brain was at onco removed, The back of tho man’s skull was then removed, tho diseased portion of his brain cut away and replaced by a part of the infant’s brain.

Then tho section of the skull was replaced. A week later the patient was rapidly improving! Sometimes brain operations result in

apparent miracles. A patient suffering from tumour on tko brain was taken into a big hospital. He had boon blind i'or seven years. When the tumour was removed the man quickly recovered not only his health but also his sight. More marvellous still, however, operations of this kind sometimes result in making a bad man good. A man was sentenced to five years' imprisonment, after being found guilty of nearly 200 robberies.

He was aged 43 and had been mure or | less criminal in his tendencies all his ' life. The prison doctor, examining him, found a dent in his skull, and learned that the man had had a bad fall when s a boy. ' i

The doctor decided to operate. He did so at once and found that the bone j was pressing on the brain. He raised j the bone and cut it away, performing the operation known as “trepanning." | The result was extraordinary. All the j man's criminal tendencies disappeared; he became quite normal. On application to the higher courts ho was released and, by latest accounts, was earning an honest livelihood.

Still more remarkable- wag the case' of a savage, forbidding brute, sentene- ! cd to imprisonment for life for murder. ! Even the warders themselves were afraid of him. After being in prison i three years a visiting surgeon examined i him and found that he had a deep de-1 pression at the back of his skull. The surgeon decided that, in all probability, a splinter of bone had been driven into the brain. He operated, found that his diagnosis was right, and removed the splinter. The man got well rapidly, but the change in his character was far more wonderful than that in his health. His whole face altered. He became bright, kindly, intelligent, and his new disposition was .as sweet and kindly as it had previously been fierce and brutal.