Talk:Neurosurgery

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This article is or was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Billynorlin.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 05:10, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

Questionable text
The text labeling the photograph says "neurosurgeon," however, no neurosurgeon is pictured. The caption should read something like "Neurosurgical Procedure"

The quoted text below is opinionative and unprofessional, and should not be included in this entry. As a reference, entries on other medical professions, such as urology, cardiology, and cardiothoracic surgery shy away from this sort of tone.


 * "Neurosurgery is widely seen as one of the most prestigious fields in medicine. This is due to the extremely complex knowledge base required to master the field as well as the highly selective admission criteria for entry into neurosurgery residency programs. Finally, the minimal 6-7 year postgraduate training period required for neurosurgery is also among the longest and most challenging of any medical specialty."

Linguadue 20:25, 7 March 2006 (UTC)


 * On the other hand, Americans refer to "brain surgeons" as one of the most prestigious professional fields, requiring proverbial intelligence and skill. Please change the paragraph to adequately reflect this obvious reality, but don't just remove it. JFW | T@lk  21:52, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

'On the other hand, Americans refer to "brain surgeons" as one of the most prestigious professional fields...' is a notion derived from the American popular culture and wrought with sensational bias. The Anglo-American focus is further contrary to the neutral point of view, as Neurosurgery is an international field.

Readers turning to an encyclopedic entry on Neurosurgery are seeking factual, un-biased, information on the field.

'In the United Kingdom, competition is fierce for the senior house officer and specialist registrar posts leading up to a consultant qualification[1].' I did not delete this line from the article because it was referenced to a relevant and reliable source.

Wikipedia cannot be a forum to compare one medical field to all the others. I don't know one medical field that doesn't require proverbial intelligence and skill, that doesn't require an extremely complex knowledge base, and that doesn't have a long and challenging residency.

Out of curiosity, what is your specialty?

Linguadue 19:42, 13 March 2006 (UTC)


 * This isn't brain surgery rocket science. If the field's prestige is verifiable and notable, then it stays in.  Otherwise, it goes.  It doesn't really matter what the other specialties happen to include. WhatamIdoing (talk) 08:24, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

Neuropathology
The history part about neuropathology does not seem accurate and the comment about gods seems unnecessary. Shifting focus from 'the gods' to the body itself must have happened much earlier. What's more, Thomas Hodgkin was only 12 years old 1810, and this year was not mentioned in the source that this text referenced.


 * ″Pathology has been studied ever since men have decided to cut each other open and see what is inside. But only within the last few hundred years has medicine focused on a tissue- and organ-based approach to tissue disease. In 1810, Thomas Hodgkin started to look at the damaged tissue for the cause, not the gods. This was conjoined with the emergence of microscopy and started the current understanding of how the tissue of the human body is studied.″

HrEkstedt (talk) 16:58, 28 February 2017 (UTC)

Quoted text
The quoted text from the "U.S. Accreditation Council of Graduate Medical Education," seems to be written by and for a professional audience with more than a passing acquaintance with medical terminology.

Someone should clarify terms, provide links and generally re-structure this page. I found it less than helpful in understanding the history, current state of the field and pointers to recent developments.

I have just looked up references (2) and (3) on this page and in both cases the text I have found does not seem to support the claims in the Education sections supposed to be backed by those references. Nethertheless it seems like the claims themselves aren’t incorrect. Just the references TPDKIEH (talk) 13:48, 10 July 2018 (UTC)

Layman's definition please
The U.S. Accreditation Council of Graduate Medical Education definition given is aimed at graduate medical students and is rather too much for the layman. Can anyone come up with something easier to follow, but still accurate? Landolitan 15:58, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

Encyclopedia Salesman
I just came back from a homeschooling convention, where I met an encyclopedia salesman among the booths who claimed that he created a fictitious "brain surgery" article in Wikipedia (I guess) in order to demonstrate Wikipedia's vulnerability to error. I told him I would fix it immediately and got on wifi to do just that. But I was unable to find any obvious errors and couldn't get anything more out of him than angry looks. Is this a standard spiel among Britannica salesman? The conversation went like this:

Salesman: What's your favorite encyclopedia?

Me: Wikipedia!

Salesman: You know the "brain surgery" article? I put a completely fictitious article up there myself! Yes, I did it myself!

Me: I will fix it immediately... 

Salesman:

Dbabbitt 01:02, 30 April 2007 (UTC)
 * That's called being a good salesman DrSatan (talk) 03:28, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

It's called being a dickhead and getting shown up for it, in a most deserving way. Nice going Dbabbitt, stick it to the man! CybergothiChé (talk) 10:32, 26 September 2010 (UTC)

Pediartics
Neurosurgery should also cover VP shunt as this procedure is the most common practise in children. To manage the patients with hematoma (e.g. epi/subdural) from traffic acidents occupied the most neurosurgical procedures (almost 90%). This should be mentioned as well, otherwise, this article is talking about nothing indeed. Coloane (talk) 23:30, 12 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Be bold -- if you can cite reliable, verifiable sources for those items, be bold and add them. - Ageekgal (talk) 05:20, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

PNS
the first sentense may have problem. PNS hasn't much neurosurigcal significance. Mostly these cases are the responsbilities for general surgeons even it is related to nervous system. Coloane (talk) 00:39, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

lack diagnostic info + GCS
this article should create a section for diagnostic procedure specifically for neurosurgery(brain surgery). Comprehensive examination by CT scan should be mentioned from the superficial cortical area to limbic system. Plus scores from the GCS should be mentioned in order to figure out the situation of patients before/after surgical operation. Without this info, this article is talking about nothing. Coloane (talk) 00:46, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

In the United States there are only about 3,000 neurosurgeons. and? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 58.107.132.232 (talk) 08:19, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

Source of history
Good article here that would be useful incorporated into the article: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/24/health/24brain.html


 * -- John Broughton (♫♫) 15:38, 25 August 2010 (UTC)

Not mentioning Professor Gazi Yasargil, the founder of Microneurosurgery in the 'SEE ALSO' section is vandalism itself. Please do not delete this edit without giving any reason. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Zartus (talk • contribs) 17:11, 25 October 2010 (UTC)

I deleted the history page as it is a joke right now. There is no mention of any surgeries done by the greeks, or the Indians in the BC era. Furthermore, the two sentences do not constitute creating an independent heading... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 157.182.99.166 (talk) 22:44, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

I agree with the user "Zartus", about deleting the name of Gazi Yasargil. Somebody deleted his name again. This is vandalism. Currently I undid this change, but probably it will be deleted again by some people who have inferiority complex.

An advice to them please look at the abstract of the article on http://journals.lww.com/neurosurgery/pages/articleviewer.aspx?year=1999&issue=11000&article=00010&type=abstract

And an advice to the moderators, please make this article semi-protected. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 94.54.71.130 (talk) 00:03, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

I'm considering adding to the history section as part of a course project. I've found three sources so far that seem to be promising. I'd like to expand on the ancient Germanic practice of neurosurgery as well, and I have several high-quality photographs depicting a skull that was operated on from this time period. --Billynorlin (talk) 04:31, 8 October 2017 (UTC)

"Vascular and endovascular surgery" a section of neurosurgery?
While i recognize that neuro intervnetionalists do things like coil cerebral aneurysms, vascular and endovascular surgery is also its own specialty separate from neurosurg. I fell like there should be a comment about that at least here if it is mentioned.

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Proposed additions
I'm wanting to add this to the history of neurosurgery section: Neurosurgery in the Neolithic Age In 1910, Paul Berger excavated underneath a Bronze age hearth near Halle, Germany, where he unearthed human remains that showed crude surgical openings in the skull. The remains were dated to between 2700 – 2200 BCE. The skull had two trephinations and these operations were performed at different times. Trephinations are crude surgical holes made through either scraping, cutting, or drilling away the layers of bone, and great care is taken to preserve the outermost lining of the brain, the dura mater. Further analysis of the bones concluded that the areas around the holes began to heal, which suggests that this person survived for months to years after the trephinations. Researchers hypothesize that since certain regions contained more skulls with trephinations, this practice may be rooted in superstitious beliefs. Trephinations were conducted “with rudimental anesthetic, antiseptic, and technological aids.” Alfieri, Alex, et al. "The Woman of Pritschoena: An Example of the German Neolithic Neurosurgery in Saxony-Anhalt." Journal of the History of the Neurosciences, vol. 21, no. 2, 2012, pp. 139-146. EBSCOhost, libraries.ou.edu/access.aspx?url=http://search.ebscohost.com.ezproxy.lib.ou.edu/login.aspx?direct=true&db=htm&AN=XISI1211249-H&site=ehost-live. Alfieri, Alex, Christian Strauss, Harald Meller, Bettina Stoll-Tucker, Pawel Tacik, and Silvio Brandt. 2012. "The Woman of Pritschoena: An Example of the German Neolithic Neurosurgery in Saxony-Anhalt." Journal Of The History Of The Neurosciences 21, no. 2: 139-146. History of Science, Technology & Medicine, EBSCOhost (accessed November 18, 2017).

Development in the early 1900s Looking at the structure of the skull without operating became possible with the advent of X-ray machines in 1896. Surviving records from Dr. Harvey Cushing at Johns Hopkins Hospital revealed greater care being taken in neurosurgery. During this time, surgeons did not wear gloves or masks and operated as quickly as possible. Cushing was critical of this practice and compared these operations to “the way a commercial traveler grabs breakfast at a lunch counter.” He studied how blood vessels in the brain reacted to changes in intracranial pressure by placing glass windows in the skulls of dogs. Using what he learned form these studies, he was able to perform brain tumor resections. Cushing’s efforts to combat sepsis and improve surgical techniques decreased the mortality rates for penetrating skull injuries from 54.4% to 28.8% over the course of a three-month period.

Kinsman, Michael, et al. "Harvey Cushing's Early Experience with the Surgical Treatment of Head Trauma." Journal Of The History Of The Neurosciences 22, no. 1 (2013): 96-115. History of Science, Technology & Medicine, EBSCOhost (accessed November 18, 2017). Kinsman, Michael, et al. "Harvey Cushing's Early Experience with the Surgical Treatment of Head Trauma." Journal of the History of the Neurosciences, vol. 22, no. 1, 2013, pp. 96-115. EBSCOhost, libraries.ou.edu/access.aspx?url=http://search.ebscohost.com.ezproxy.lib.ou.edu/login.aspx?direct=true&db=htm&AN=XISI1211275-H&site=ehost-live.

I still need to incorporate the sources and choose the best citation style for them. Any feedback would be appreciated. Billynorlin (talk) 23:37, 18 November 2017 (UTC)


 * Please see WP:MEDHOW for formatting citations. The writing could be made tighter.  Try leaving out the quotes and adjectives and we generally don't use honorifics like "Dr.".  Just plain and simple.  You might also want to have a look at Trepanning and link to it and see also Harvey Cushing. Jytdog (talk) 00:08, 19 November 2017 (UTC)

External links modified (February 2018)
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Main divisions
Where did this list come from? Is this a widespread system of neurosurgery subtypes, or is this just someone's idea? Natureium (talk) 11:47, 10 June 2018 (UTC)

Comma
"... After residency or in some cases, as a senior resident."

Seems it should be either, "after residency or, in some cases, as a senior resident" or "after residency or in some cases as a senior resident."

Thank goodness I came along! (Har.) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.29.63.96 (talk) 13:12, 30 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Why didn't you just fix it yourself? -  Julietdeltalima   (talk)  15:51, 28 September 2020 (UTC)

Lobotomy: No mention!?!?!?!
I find it rather strange there's no mention of lobotomy, even to denounce it as fraud neurosurgery. After all, "Ancient" has a section, and then there's a leap to electrodes. That's a little ridiculous. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.71.166.197 (talk) 18:41, 2 December 2021 (UTC)