Leucotome

{{Short description|Surgical instrument}}

Image:Leucotome.gif

A leucotome or McKenzie leucotome is a surgical instrument used for performing leucotomies (also known as lobotomy) and other forms of psychosurgery.

Invented by Canadian neurosurgeon Dr. Kenneth G. McKenzie in the 1940s, the 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.{{Cite web |date=1954-07-01 |title=Kenneth G. McKenzie |url=https://www.cns.org/meetings/past-honored-guests-detail/kenneth-g-mckenzie |access-date=2023-11-05 |website=Congress of Neurological Surgeons |language=en}} This type was used by the Nobel Prize-winning Portuguese neurologist Egas Moniz.{{Cite web |title=The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1949 |url=https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/medicine/1949/moniz/article/ |access-date=2023-11-05 |website=NobelPrize.org |language=en-US}}

File:Leucotome,_designed_by_Neurosurgeon_Dr_John_Crumbie_1955_(front_view).jpg, 1955{{Cite web |title=The Museum of Medicine and Health : Leucotome |url=https://www.digitalcollections.manchester.ac.uk/view/MH-01984-00086 |access-date=2023-11-05 |website=Manchester Digital Collections |language=en-GB}}]]

Another, different, surgical instrument also called a leucotome was introduced by Walter Freeman for use in the transorbital lobotomy. Modeled after an ice-pick, it consisted simply of a pointed shaft. It was passed through the tear duct under the eyelid and against the top of the eyesocket. A mallet was used to drive the instrument through the thin layer of bone and into the brain along the plane of the bridge of the nose, to a depth of 5 cm. Due to incidents of breakage, a stronger but essentially identical instrument called an orbitoclast was later used.{{Cite web |year=2005 |orig-date=2005-10-16 |title='My Lobotomy': Howard Dully's Journey |url=https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5014080 |access-date=2023-10-05 |website=NPR}}

Lobotomies were commonly performed from the 1930s to the 1960s, with a few as late as the 1980s in France.{{cite news|title=La neurochirurgie fonctionnelle d'affections psychiatriques sévères |publisher=Comité Consultatif National d'Ethique |date=2002-04-25 |url=http://www.ccne-ethique.fr/docs/fr/avis071.pdf |language=fr |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110720211020/http://www.ccne-ethique.fr/docs/fr/avis071.pdf |archive-date=2011-07-20 }} (French national consultative committee on ethics, opinion #71: Functional neurosurgery of severe psychiatric conditions)