Citation

Plummer C, Vellar ID, Murphy MA, Cook MJ. J. Hist. Neurosci. 2008; 17(1): 33-45.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2008, Informa Healthcare)

DOI

10.1080/09647040600792622

PMID

18161595

Abstract

In 1894 at St. Vincent's Hospital Melbourne, George Adlington Syme removed a meningioma from a patient with symptomatic focal epilepsy. The operation stands as the first surgery based on seizure localization in Australia. It is also the country's first documented successful resection of an intracranial meningioma. It followed William Macewen's landmark cerebral localization case on the boy John McKinley by 18 years and Victor Horsley's first epilepsy case on Hughlings Jackson's patient James B. by a mere 8 years. Syme's patient, Constable John G., survived the operation by some 23 years, dying from a gunshot wound to the head in 1917. Newly discovered inquest papers reveal that the coroner's judgment that the death was accidental completely fails to address the more credible scenario of suicide. The story makes for a fascinating epilogue to an important landmark in Australia's neurosurgical history.

Language: en

Keywords

Australia; Epilepsies, Partial; History, 19th Century; History, 20th Century; Humans; Meningioma; Neurosurgery; Seizures