Egas Moniz Was a Portuguese

Egas Moniz was a Portuguese psychiatrist and neurosurgeon who won the Nobel Prize for his controversial "discovery of the therapeutic value of leucotomy in certain psychoses." He is best known as the inventor of prefrontal leucotomy, which was the foundation for what American surgeons changed to lobotomy, or a severing of the neural fibers. The purpose of Moniz's approach was to serve as a radical treatment for several kinds of mental diseases. The procedure focused on interrupted the nerve fibers which connected the thalamus to the prefrontal cortex, thus effecting the relay of sensory information coming into the brain, including emotions.

Although Dr. Moniz's procedure is often associated with the American lobotomy, as developed by Walter Friedman, they are in fact quite different. The lobotomy, unlike Moniz's leucotomy, was a much cruder procedure that was used indiscriminately.

The document cited demonstrates that Moniz's procedure does have particular advantages when used in treating psychiatric disorders in well-selected patients. According to the report, it shows statistical data of the benefits of the procedure derived from case studies.

Dr. Moniz introduces his procedure as being a "simple operation, always safe" and which "may prove to be an effective surgical treatment in certain cases of mental disorder." In order to promote and justify this claim, he cites several case studies that he used in developing his procedure and the overall results. According to Moniz, all of his case studies proved to be beneficial in treating various mental disorders. He further states that these case studies and the data gathered from them speak for themselves and that "the results are not a mere coincidence."