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February 2001 How Many Persons Are You?!? Part 2 Split brain patients?In the 1960s some doctors decided to perform radical brain surgery to relieve severe epilepsy. Persons suffering from epilepsy suffer from disabling fits when the electrical impulses in their brain become erratic in one area, and sweep across the brain. In severe cases, persons can experience hundreds of fits a day and are unable to live a normal life. The brain consists of two hemispheres, and it is known that people are able to live with only one hemisphere - in fact, in the case of a severe brain tumour, a whole hemisphere can be removed and the patient survive. With these facts in mind, doctors concluded that if they were able to isolate an epileptic attack to one hemisphere only, the epileptic person may be able to lead a more normal life, without fits. However, the two hemispheres of the brain are connected by a huge band of fibers, and it is through this band, the corpus collusum, that epileptic fits can spread across the entire brain. So what was the solution? To separate the hemispheres of these patients by completely severing the corpus collusum. And this is what they did. The patients gained some semblance of normal life, and the procedure seemed to be a great success. However, it was only later that some curious side effects of the procedure were revealed. What happened?Psychologists are very keen on experimenting to find out people's cognitive abilities. When 'split brain' patients underwent some of these tests, curious results arose... But first... Do you know about brain functions? Maybe not - don't worry, I'll give you a little insight into the different functions of the hemispheres of the brain. If you know all about brains, you can just click past:-) Tell Me More About Brains! Skip the Brain Section - Carry on with Split Brains! |
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