Latest / Fork U with Dr. Terry Simpson / Ancient Neurosurgery and Modern Brain Scams

Transcript

Ancient Neurosurgery and Modern Brain Scams · Fork U with Dr. Terry Simpson

• 0:04
  >> Dr. Terry Simpson: Right now, I am standing in the Surgeons Hall Museum
• 0:07
  in Edinburgh. It's one of the oldest
• 0:09
  surgical museums in the world, filled with
• 0:12
  skulls, saws and surgical tools that tell
• 0:15
  the stories of medicine's slow,
• 0:17
  stumbling progress. And today, we're going to talk about
• 0:20
  one of the oldest and sometimes the most horrifying
• 0:23
  ideas in medicine and surgery. That the best way to
• 0:26
  treat mental illness was to drill a hole in
• 0:29
  your head.
• 0:34
  I'm Dr. Terry Simpson, your chief medical
• 0:36
  explanationist, on site at the
• 0:38
  Surgeons Hall Museum in Edinburgh.
• 0:41
  And this is Fork U Fork
• 0:44
  University, where we unpack the weird,
• 0:47
  wild and too often wrong history
• 0:49
  of food, medicine and surgery. And we look at
• 0:52
  how bad ideas never really die.
• 0:55
  They just rebrand.
• 1:00
  Let's start today with trepanation, the
• 1:03
  practice of drilling or scraping a hole in the
• 1:06
  skull. It's one of the oldest known
• 1:08
  surgeries in human history. And here at the
• 1:11
  Surgeons Hall Museum in Edinburgh, you can
• 1:14
  see the actual ancient skulls with neat
• 1:17
  round holes carved into them. Some of these
• 1:19
  skulls show clear signs of healing,
• 1:22
  meaning the patients survived, some of them
• 1:25
  for a long time. But why did they do it?
• 1:29
  That's the part we don't know.
• 1:31
  Maybe they did it to relieve pressure from a head injury.
• 1:35
  Maybe they thought they were letting out evil spirits.
• 1:37
  Maybe, just maybe, they figured out by
• 1:40
  observation that people sometimes got better
• 1:43
  when they drilled. Were they scientists
• 1:46
  or shamans, healers or hopeful butchers?
• 1:49
  Sadly, that data is lost. But we
• 1:52
  do have some disturbing data today. We
• 1:55
  do drill holes in the skull, but we do it for some really
• 1:58
  good reasons. If someone has increased
• 2:01
  intracranial pressure after trauma, meaning high
• 2:03
  pressure in their brain, we drill a hole. Or
• 2:06
  sometimes if they have a subdural hematoma or a brain
• 2:09
  bleed, we drill a hole to remove the clot, to relieve
• 2:12
  the pressure on the brain. So you don't have stroke like symptoms or
• 2:15
  lose second grade. And in some severe
• 2:18
  brain injuries, we even remove a portion of the
• 2:21
  skull to let the brain swell without
• 2:24
  compression. So trepanation as a
• 2:26
  technique isn't the problem. The problem
• 2:29
  was a lack of understanding about why it works sometimes
• 2:32
  and not others. And before we did the
• 2:35
  research, we made things up,
• 2:38
  meaning we saw it work once and assumed it was always
• 2:41
  the answer. We saw a survivor and declared it
• 2:44
  a cure. It's the oldest mistake in
• 2:47
  medicine and one we and the
• 2:50
  public keep repeating. Fast
• 2:53
  forward to the 20th century. Take Dr.
• 2:56
  Henry Cotton, a psychiatrist who believed that mental
• 2:58
  illness came from hidden infections in the body. So what
• 3:01
  did he do? He had his surgeons remove teeth,
• 3:04
  tonsils, gallbladders and pieces of colon to
• 3:07
  cure psychosis. Many of his patients
• 3:10
  died and the rest didn't improve. But he
• 3:13
  was celebrated in medical journals. He ran a major
• 3:16
  institution, he lectured. He wasn't a
• 3:18
  fringe player. He was medicine's main stage.
• 3:21
  And that's the real horror. Even
• 3:24
  when evidence showed that his surgeries caused harm, his
• 3:27
  reputation protected him. Because confidence
• 3:30
  often beats data. Hello,
• 3:32
  Gary Brecke and Paul Saladino.
• 3:35
  Today we don't drill holes in the skull to release
• 3:38
  spirits. But we still try to hack the brain
• 3:42
  with products that offer less harm but just
• 3:44
  as little proof. One of the biggest fears in
• 3:47
  America today is dementia. So why do people
• 3:50
  turn to things like lion mane's mushroom? Because
• 3:53
  it promises to regrow brain cells, boost memory and
• 3:56
  prevent Alzheimer's. Some lab studies are
• 3:59
  promising, but real clinic evidence, almost
• 4:02
  none and has never been repleted.
• 4:05
  Still, it is a booming industry.
• 4:08
  A $50 a bottle, memory gummies, mushroom
• 4:11
  coffee, neurotropics. Meanwhile, two real
• 4:13
  diets, the mind and Mediterranean diets, can
• 4:16
  reduce dementia risk by almost half.
• 4:20
  But eating well doesn't make anybody rich.
• 4:23
  We chase the shiny pill and ignore the
• 4:26
  olive oil. Let's look at orthopedic
• 4:28
  surgery. Some surgeons offer
• 4:31
  platelet derived growth factor for injections. They
• 4:34
  spin your blood, pull out the platelets and inject them
• 4:37
  back. The idea, boost healing,
• 4:40
  help your recovery. The evidence,
• 4:43
  weak or absent from most uses. And I should know because
• 4:46
  I helped publish one of the first studies showing
• 4:49
  platelet derived factor helped with
• 4:51
  patients with diabetic wounds. That was valid,
• 4:54
  but now it's used from everything from tennis elbow to torn
• 4:57
  knees to post op shoulders with no proof
• 5:00
  but high building codes because that is not
• 5:03
  covered by insurance. So it is
• 5:05
  a tax on your health care from the
• 5:08
  orthopedic surgeon to you that
• 5:11
  you pay for. Because the orthopedic surgeon, the
• 5:14
  person that you have your confidence in, says this
• 5:17
  will help you heal better and recover faster. And
• 5:20
  you're just giving your orthopedic surgeon an extra 2000 bucks
• 5:23
  to feel good and get a band aid. It's
• 5:26
  trepanation with better lighting and
• 5:28
  sterile gloves. As I walk through this
• 5:31
  museum, one thing is clear. We've always
• 5:34
  meant well. But meaning well isn't
• 5:37
  enough. Progress in medicine and surgery
• 5:40
  means being willing to say we're wrong.
• 5:43
  It means asking, does this actually help people?
• 5:47
  Science moves forward when we replace story with
• 5:50
  evidence. That goes for trepening and
• 5:53
  lion's mane mushroom.
• 5:58
  This episode was written and recorded by me, Dr. Terri
• 6:01
  Simpson, standing right here in the halls of the Royal College of
• 6:04
  Surgeons in Edinburgh. You can find references and
• 6:06
  more@yourdoctorsorders.com and
• 6:09
  forku.com and while I am a board
• 6:11
  certified surgeon, I am not your
• 6:14
  physician. If you're tempted by PRP Brain
• 6:17
  Mushrooms or the next TikTok Brain Booster,
• 6:20
  talk to a real doctor and a registered
• 6:22
  dietitian. Not to your chiropractor, not
• 6:25
  the shaman in Luaman, and not the guy who
• 6:28
  drilled a hole in your head for clarity.
• 6:31
  This episode was produced by Simpler Media and the man with
• 6:34
  more wisdom than any mushroom Evotera.
• 6:37
  Have a good week.
• 6:43
  Hey Evo, if a wellness influencer told you
• 6:46
  mental clarity comes from drilling a hole in your skull,
• 6:49
  would you try that? Or do you think a good
• 6:52
  IPA would serve just as well?
• 6:56
  >> Speaker B: Aye, right. Craft beer might be just the thing
• 6:59
  for you, but you're up there in the Scottish
• 7:02
  Highlands, so I'd be thinking there, Dr.
• 7:05
  Simpson, that a nice single malt might be more what
• 7:08
  you're looking for. I can't tell if that's Scottish
• 7:11
  or pirate. Anyhow.