Leucotome

A leucotome is a surgical instrument used for performing lobotomies or leucotomies.

Advertisement for a Leucotome in the 1940's

One type of leucotome has a narrow shaft which is inserted into the brain through a hole in the skull, and then a plunger on the back of the leucotome is depressed to extend a wire loop or metal strip into the brain. The leucotome is then rotated, cutting a core of brain tissue. This type was used by the Nobel prize-winning Portuguese neurologist Egas Moniz.

Another, different, surgical instrument also called a leucotome was introduced by Walter Freeman. It consisted simply of a pointed shaft—an ice-pick was used in preliminary tests on cadavers, and this instrument is essentially an ice-pick used for surgery. It is passed through the eye socket, with no need to penetrate the skull, and struck with a hammer; the operation was called a transorbital lobotomy. A stronger but essentially identical instrument called an orbitoclast was later used.

Lobotomies were frequently performed from the 1930s to the 1950s, with a few as late as 1986, but are no longer used.

See also

• Orbitoclast
• Lobotomy

External links

• A leucotome from the University of Manchester Medical School Museum
• The Nobel Foundation page on prefrontal leukotomy

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