Biomedical subjects

M A Brazier

Publications and source records attributed to M A Brazier.

4 recordsLinked to original sources

PubMed1979

Challenges from the philosophers to the neuroscientists.

A practical science of the brain scarcely existed before the 17th century except in terms of gross anatomy. In all countries vitalistic concepts held sway, yielding only slowly to more materialistic views. These developed at a different pace in different countries, due, in each case, to the dominant philosophies of the time: the English empiricists; the French Enlightenment; the Italian and German schools of experimental neurophysiology. The last to accept the materialists' viewpoints was Russia, whose scientists imported them from their training in Western Europe in the 19th century. A brief outline is given of how the history of brain science parallels the history of ideas in the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries.

Brain↗

PubMed1979

Thirty years.

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PubMed1978

Tests of the predictive value of EEG recording from within the brain in the partial epilepsies.

The EEG, as recorded from electrodes in deep structures of the brain in cases of intractable seizures, has been surveyed to assess its predictive value in the partial epilepsies. In addition to scalp EEGs and depth EEGs in control situations, ictal recordings of tape-recorded seizures and the interictal enhancement of EEG signs by benzodiazepines have been analyzed. All results have been quantified by computer analysis. The predictive value of the EEGs has been assessed in 2 ways: (1) by comparison with the pathology found after surgery and (2) by the long-term clinical status of the patient postoperatively. Twelve cases with lesions found in limbic structures and 6 with cortical involvement are reported. In the latter cases secondary firing of the hippocampus, with its low threshold for seizures, frequently followed, though more rapidly than could be timed by visual inspection alone. Bilateral signs both in scalp EEGs and in depth were a common finding in the cases with limbic lesions. In those patients with marked clinical improvement, follow-up computerized studies of pre- and post-operative scalp EEGs revealed normalization in both hemispheres, leading to the proposal that a focus of defective tissue may impair neuronal function in widely distant regions of the brain.

Adolescent↗

PubMed1975

Long term follow-up of EEG changes following therapeutic surgery in epilepsy.

Four cases, given in some detail, illustrate the effort to compare scalp EEGs taken before surgery for intractable seizures with those recorded some years postoperatively, and to relate these, together with the computer analyses of seizure activity recorded in depth, with the pathology found in the removed tissue and, importantly, with the postoperative clinical state of the patient. These four cases illustrate the following results: (1) Confirmation by histology and ultrastructure studies of abnormal neuronal tissue at the site pinpointed by computer analysis of EEGs as the driving focus for the electrical seizure discharge. (2) Correlation of clinical and behavioral improvement with normalization of the EEG, objectively quantified by computer analysis. Examples are given of excellent recovery (3 cases) and one of, at present, partial recovery.

Adolescent↗