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Dr. Bob is Robert Hsiung, MD,
bob@dr-bob.orgShown: posts 1 to 16 of 16. This is the beginning of the thread.
Posted by Christ_empowered on May 31, 2015, at 12:03:18
I know: morbid. But seriously, when did docs stop lobotomizing people? A lot of basic articles say Tofranil, Meprobamate, Thorazine, and the MAOIs put an end to the practice, but it appears that lobotomies were still done well into the 1970s. I read one 1980 newspaper article about lobotomy that said 200 or so were still performed each year (!).
Do you think they still do them? Maybe in state mental hospitals?
Posted by baseball55 on May 31, 2015, at 18:03:28
In reply to when did docs stop doing lobotomies?, posted by Christ_empowered on May 31, 2015, at 12:03:18
> I know: morbid. But seriously, when did docs stop lobotomizing people? A lot of basic articles say Tofranil, Meprobamate, Thorazine, and the MAOIs put an end to the practice, but it appears that lobotomies were still done well into the 1970s. I read one 1980 newspaper article about lobotomy that said 200 or so were still performed each year (!).
>
> Do you think they still do them? Maybe in state mental hospitals?Interesting question. I'd love to know the answer. I don't think they're still done at all. I don't even think they are legal, or at least, would stand up to a malpractice case. I know some people have this idea that some state hospital system exists where people are held long term, etc. But, except for the criminally insane, there are virtually no long-term state hospital beds left in MA (where I live), nor in any of the surrounding states. Maybe this is different where you are?
Posted by Christ_empowered on May 31, 2015, at 18:41:32
In reply to Re: when did docs stop doing lobotomies?, posted by baseball55 on May 31, 2015, at 18:03:28
here the Guilty But Mentally Ill go to a super special psychoprison and the not guilty by reason of insanity are first kept in the state mental hospital and then kept on some kind of supervision by the dept. probation.
I think lobotomies "worked" better in long term state mental hospital patients. A lot of patients lost the ability support themselves completely, post-op, so it would make sense to keep them somewhere where they could be looked after and hopefully kept engaged in some sort of activity.
I'm just fascinated. Apparently, some lobotmies=good results by anybody's standards. Some people had multiple procedures. The most I've read about is 3 procedures (!). I don't know why they wouldn't just try something else if the first 1 (or 2) failed, but..OK.
Posted by rjlockhart37 on May 31, 2015, at 21:43:39
In reply to Re: when did docs stop doing lobotomies?, posted by Christ_empowered on May 31, 2015, at 18:41:32
maybe they do it if.....1 the patient is extremly disturbed, violent, or just vary disturbed, and ... none of anything including shock and drugs helped, but it also depends much on the doctor and the state hospital's guidelines.......
but lobotomies really are known for barbaric treatment, it's like really crude.....like ripping out a bone in the leg so it won't stick out instead of trying to merge it back into one of the main bone
r
Posted by alexandra_k on June 6, 2015, at 15:43:51
In reply to Re: when did docs stop doing lobotomies?, posted by rjlockhart37 on May 31, 2015, at 21:43:39
I don't know the answer to this. I do remember reading that the old generation anti-psychotics were initially hailed as 'chemical lobotomies'. The idea was that they gave a reversible lobotomy effect without the surgery.
But then the target audience widened considerably and the lobotomising effect (for which they were initially hailed) became viewed as 'unwanted'. Also... Out of patient... Also... It became less obvious that they weren't doing long term damage and movement problems...
So the newer generation ones were born.
Posted by alexandra_k on June 6, 2015, at 15:52:26
In reply to Re: when did docs stop doing lobotomies?, posted by alexandra_k on June 6, 2015, at 15:43:51
Forensics. That is what we call the criminally insane. The prison / mental institution combo thing. At least that is what it is called in this part. The 'forensics ward'.
I think we give them depo shots of old generation anti-psychotics. Not entirely sure... But I think that is the idea. The chemical straightjacket / lobotomy thing. Seems... More humane... Somehow... To give an injection every couple of weeks. To keep things, uh, peaceful, that way.
I don't actually know.
A number of people in the non-forensics ward were managed that way. At least they were when I went through... But we are cheapo cheapo on the medications...
I remember when risperidol was new... and seroquel.... give them a different name and make it just that tiny bit harder for patients to read about the medications on the internet and so on, I suppose... Make us think we actually have something new instead of old technology... Let us discover it isn't all it's cracked up to be in our own good time...
I remember when people were getting special government approval for (government funded) clozapine. That was being hailed (by patients even if not the doctors who were prescribing them) as... Well... Hope... But also... Much of the good (chemical lobotomy) effects of the good old older generations. Don't know what's doing it for pharma and / or them these days...
Posted by LostBoyinNC46 on June 8, 2015, at 21:04:21
In reply to when did docs stop doing lobotomies?, posted by Christ_empowered on May 31, 2015, at 12:03:18
In the USA, I believe old fashioned style lobotomies were formally stopped in the early seventies. I believe the last one was done in 1973 in the USA.
In other countries, I dont know how long they were done. I have read classic lobotomies are still legal in Australia and to this day, a few are still done there a year. Ive also read Neurologists in China are doing them to Chinese mental patients today, just to make fast money.
I suppose if you wanted one bad enough and could cough up the $$$$, you could fly to Australia and consult some Australian psychiatrist about it. And for the right amount of $$$ they'd be more than glad to cut up your frontal lobes for ya to get you to shut up about your depression/anxiety problems.
In America, which is mainly what I know about, lobotomies were initially marketed by Freeman and a tiny group of Neurologists as a "treatment" for severe mental illness. That would actually cure the patient. The "cure" was to mainly turn the mentally ill patient into a zombie, like a walking dead person...basically a person that would just shut up and be docile and submissive and not complain about stuff.
In other words, old fashioned lobotomies were done for behavioral control reasons, not to actually really treat the illness for real and normalize the person.
ECT also used to be used in the same manner, to scare mental patients into submission, especially in old psychiatric hospitals. Get out of line and maybe get a little agitated? You might get shocked. Or if you really got out of line, you might get lobotomized. In other words, if you pissed off the psychiatry staff bad enough.
That is depicted well in the Jack Nicholson movie, "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest," which depicted a sixties era VA psychiatric hospital, where ECT and lobotomies were done for purely behavioral control reasons. And usually not to criminally insane patients, but to patients who just were regular psych patients, but maybe agitated and a PITA for the hospital staff to deal with.
The objective was just to shut your stuff down, make you submissive, quiet, docile, obedient and not complain about things.
Lobotomies had absolutely nothing to do with actually fixing or treating severe mental illness in a way that really cured you.
Eric AKA "LostBoyinNC"
Posted by LostBoyinNC46 on June 8, 2015, at 21:05:02
In reply to when did docs stop doing lobotomies?, posted by Christ_empowered on May 31, 2015, at 12:03:18
In the USA, I believe old fashioned style lobotomies were formally stopped in the early seventies. I believe the last one was done in 1973 in the USA.
In other countries, I dont know how long they were done. I have read classic lobotomies are still legal in Australia and to this day, a few are still done there a year. Ive also read Neurologists in China are doing them to Chinese mental patients today, just to make fast money.
I suppose if you wanted one bad enough and could cough up the $$$$, you could fly to Australia and consult some Australian psychiatrist about it. And for the right amount of $$$ they'd be more than glad to cut up your frontal lobes for ya to get you to shut up about your depression/anxiety problems.
In America, which is mainly what I know about, lobotomies were initially marketed by Freeman and a tiny group of Neurologists as a "treatment" for severe mental illness. That would actually cure the patient. The "cure" was to mainly turn the mentally ill patient into a zombie, like a walking dead person...basically a person that would just shut up and be docile and submissive and not complain about stuff.
In other words, old fashioned lobotomies were done for behavioral control reasons, not to actually really treat the illness for real and normalize the person.
ECT also used to be used in the same manner, to scare mental patients into submission, especially in old psychiatric hospitals. Get out of line and maybe get a little agitated? You might get shocked. Or if you really got out of line, you might get lobotomized. In other words, if you pissed off the psychiatry staff bad enough.
That is depicted well in the Jack Nicholson movie, "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest," which depicted a sixties era VA psychiatric hospital, where ECT and lobotomies were done for purely behavioral control reasons. And usually not to criminally insane patients, but to patients who just were regular psych patients, but maybe agitated and a PITA for the hospital staff to deal with.
The objective was just to shut your stuff down, make you submissive, quiet, docile, obedient and not complain about things.
Lobotomies had absolutely nothing to do with actually fixing or treating severe mental illness in a way that really cured you.
Eric AKA "LostBoyinNC"
Posted by LostBoyinNC46 on June 8, 2015, at 21:08:20
In reply to Re: in the early seventies in the USA, posted by LostBoyinNC46 on June 8, 2015, at 21:04:21
I believe lobotomies might be actually illegal to perform in the state of California. Dont quote me on that, but Im pretty sure of it.
Eric
Posted by Christ_empowered on June 9, 2015, at 6:51:56
In reply to Re: in the early seventies in the USA, posted by LostBoyinNC46 on June 8, 2015, at 21:05:02
cool. I don't want one, lol. As is, I'm trying to lower my Abilify :-)
I just have this fascination with them...its like, the whole brain damage=effective therapy is still with us. I read that in psychiatry, the worse the side effects, the more shrinks will call it "effective." Ever notice that? Like TCAs are "effective for severe depression," Clozapine is "sometimes dangerous, but extremely effective," so on and so forth.
ECT is bad enough. I had involuntary shock...not court order or anything, just some horrible docs at a mental hospital, power trip...blasted back to the stone age. I'm just now recovering, and its been 7 years.
Also, lobotomies interest me because the patients' responses were so variable. Some...it rolled right off of them...others were destroyed, irreparably. Weird, huh?
Anyway, I sometimes wonder if state mental hospitals don't still do it. I mean, who would know? Who would care?
Posted by LostBoyinNC46 on June 9, 2015, at 13:42:26
In reply to Re: in the early seventies in the USA, posted by Christ_empowered on June 9, 2015, at 6:51:56
Plenty of people would care if lobotomies were still done in state psychiatric hospitals. For one, litigation attorneys would be REALLY interested. Because giving someone a lobotomy in the USA these days is basically battery. A litigation attorney could make a killing off a lobotomy patient, especially if the patient had any family or friends left that halfway cared about their loved one.Also, civil rights attorneys would care A LOT. Such as the ACLU, civil rights legal activists have done a huge amount in the USA in the past several decades to dramatically tone down the severity and frequency of abuse that used to regularly go on in these psychiatric hospitals. Most of that work was done in the sixties, seventies and eighties.
It would definitely perk up some ears, including mine.
BTW, Im not digging you or anything, but having an "obsession" with lobotomies is kinda strange, to be honest. Even by severe mental illness standards. Perhaps you should stay on your Abilify????
take care,
Eric AKA "LostBoyinNC"
> Anyway, I sometimes wonder if state mental hospitals don't still do it. I mean, who would know? Who would care?
>
>
Posted by Christ_empowered on June 10, 2015, at 15:04:05
In reply to Re: litigation Attorneys would be noticing, posted by LostBoyinNC46 on June 9, 2015, at 13:42:26
hey man. I guess you're right...somebody would do something if mental hospitals were still butchering patients' brains.
I'm not the only one with more than a passing interest in lobotomy, it seems. check out "The Lobotomist" . I think I'm ordering a copy soon.
Posted by LostBoyinNC46 on June 11, 2015, at 13:05:14
In reply to Re: litigation Attorneys would be noticing, posted by Christ_empowered on June 10, 2015, at 15:04:05
I hope you are not using Social Security Disability or SSI money or VA disability money to pay for a waste of time book like that. What a waste of taxpayer money that would be.
>
> I'm not the only one with more than a passing interest in lobotomy, it seems. check out "The Lobotomist" . I think I'm ordering a copy soon.
Posted by herpills on June 18, 2015, at 15:37:41
In reply to Re: litigation Attorneys would be noticing, posted by LostBoyinNC46 on June 11, 2015, at 13:05:14
> I hope you are not using Social Security Disability or SSI money or VA disability money to pay for a waste of time book like that. What a waste of taxpayer money that would be.
>
>
>Wow...such a lame and irrelevant response.
Posted by Christ_empowered on June 19, 2015, at 22:01:52
In reply to Re: litigation Attorneys would be noticing » LostBoyinNC46, posted by herpills on June 18, 2015, at 15:37:41
thank you, herpills.
Posted by rjlockhart37 on June 22, 2015, at 17:35:19
In reply to Re: litigation Attorneys would be noticing, posted by Christ_empowered on June 10, 2015, at 15:04:05
here is the documentary....
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NWdV61ahAyI
r
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