Prefrontal Lobotomy: Stepping-Stone or Pitfall?

The standard prefrontal lobotomy operation was introduced as a treatment for mental illness in 1935. Although many patients benefited from it, the neurological and psychiatric side effects often proved more disabling than the psychiatric illness itself. However, the introduction of the operation encouraged scientists to investigate the functions of the various areas of man's frontal lobes in greater detail and stimulated other workers to develop modified operative procedures. The authors discuss some of the advances made in both these areas in recent years and emphasize the continuing importance of the inferomedial lobotomy operation in psychiatric treatment.