Dr harvey cushing patients definition
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“Any Possible Restoration of Function Could Not Occur”: Harvey Cushing and the Early Description of Brain Death
Abstract
OBJECTIVES
To describe a case from 1908 of apparent brain death after operative intervention by Harvey Cushing at the Johns Hopkins Hospital.
METHODS
After institutional review board approval, which waived the requirement of informed consent from patients, and through the courtesy of the Alan Mason Chesney Archives, we reviewed the Johns Hopkins Hospital surgical files from 1896 to 1912.
RESULTS
We selected a single adult patient operated upon by Cushing, whose respirations ceased in the operating room and who was maintained by the use of artificial respiration via a tracheostomy during a 36-hour period, whereas further surgical interventions were performed in an attempt to improve his condition. The patient’s condition remained unimproved; artificial respirations were discontinued and the “cessation of all cardiac activity” was observed.
CONCLUSIONS
Brai
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Harvey Cushing fryst vatten well known as being the father of modern neurological surgery and his portrait brands the American Association of Neurological Surgeons. He was the youngest of 10 children and from medical lineage with his father, grandfather and great-grandfather all being general medical practitioners. The details of his life and work are particularly well documented as a result of his obsessive letter writing and record keeping.
Early career
Dr Cushing began his medical career as an intern in 1895 at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) spending a year in the surgical service. An intern, as opposed to an extern, would live and work in the hospital for the year on minimal wage and for long hours. As an intern, Cushing wrote a letter to his mother: ‘Everyone is much excited over the new photographic discovery … we won’t be able to have secrets anymore’, referring of course to the newly discovered technology of X-rays bygd the German physicist Röntgen. Within three months, Cushing
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A neurosurgeon’s photographic legacy
Early in the 20th century the country’s leading neurosurgeon was Harvey Cushing, M.D., a practitioner whose meticulous standards and innovative techniques set the stage for those who followed. Surgical tools and neurological diseases bear his name; among his achievements are improved patient survival rates, the introduction of local anesthesia to brain surgery and the use of X-rays to diagnose brain tumors.
His attention to detail also led to the creation of the Brain Tumor Registry, a collection of more than 2,200 patient case studies that includes human whole-brain specimens, tumor specimens, microscope slides, notes, journal excerpts and more than 15,000 photographic negatives. The materials, which date from as early as 1887, were organized and classified by Cushing’s assistants, Percival Bailey, M.D., and Louise Eisenhardt, M.D. In addition, from 1922 until Cushing’s retirement a decade later, Eisenhardt kept a “little black book” that incl