James W. Watts

James W. Watts

James Winston Watts (1904 – 1994) was a neurosurgeon, born in Lynchburg, Virginia and a graduate of the Virginia Military Institute and the University of Virginia School of Medicine. Watts is noteworthy for his professional partnership with the neurologist and psychiatrist Walter Freeman. The two became advocates and prolific practitioners of psychosurgery, specifically the lobotomy. Watts is known for carrying out the lobotomy of Rose Marie Kennedy under the supervision of Freeman.

Career

After completing medical school in 1928, Watts worked as a research fellow at Yale before joining the faculty of the Department of Neurosurgery and Neurological Surgery at The George Washington University Hospital in 1935. He remained in this position until his retirement in 1969.

Watts was recruited into a medical partnership by his colleague Walter Freeman, who needed the collaboration of a trained surgeon in order to practice the leucotomy, a technique pioneered by the Portuguese neurologist Egas Moniz. In the procedure developed by Moniz, the "white matter" in the frontal lobes was severed using a leucotome, an instrument Moniz designed specifically for the procedure. Freeman and Watts acquired several of the instruments and performed their first operation in 1936. They eventually modified the procedure to sever more of the white matter, and renamed it "lobotomy" in order to distinguish it from the earlier procedure developed by Moniz. Their technique soon became the standard form of the operation, and was known as the "Freeman-Watts Procedure".

Watts' colleague, however, was less conservative and sought other ways to access the frontal lobes of the brain without the complications associated with conventional brain surgery. Inspired by the work of the Italian psychiatrist Amarro Fiamberti, Freeman developed, without the knowledge or participation of Watts, a procedure for reaching the frontal lobes by inserting a probe under the eyelid and above the tear duct, then hammering it through the thin bone of the eye socket. The instrument was swished around, severing the white matter, and was then repeated on the other side. The whole operation took only minutes under local anesthesia. This new procedure became known as the transorbital lobotomy, also dubbed the "ice pick lobotomy" because the instrument used, an orbitoclast, was very similar to a common ice pick. The new procedure also signaled the end of the professional relationship between Freeman and Watts. After performing the new procedure by himself on ten patients, Freeman finally revealed to Watts what he had been doing. Watts, unlike Freeman, was a trained neurosurgeon and adamantly believed lobotomy should only be performed by a proper surgeon. He insisted that Freeman cease performing operations alone, but it was to no avail and Watts soon left the practice that he had jointly established with Freeman.

The 1950s saw the introduction of the first truly effective antipsychotic medications, notably Thorazine. This, combined with a growing discomfort among the medical profession and general public regarding lobotomy, led to a sharp decline in the use of the procedure. In the intervening years, the theoretical basis of lobotomy has been largely discredited.

Watts retired in 1969, but continued his association with The George Washington University Hospital until the late 1980s.

Personal life

Watts was born in 1904 in Lynchburg, Virginia. He had two children with wife Julia Harrison Watts. He died in 1994.

References

* [http://encyclopedia.gwu.edu/gwencyclopedia/index.php/Watts%2C_James_W. The GW and Foggy Bottom Historical Encyclopedia]
* [http://book2.neurosurgeon.org/?defaultarticle=&defaultnode=2671&layout=22&pagefunction=Load%20Layout Not Your Father’s Lobotomy: Psychiatric Surgery Revisited]
* [http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/medicine/articles/moniz/index.html Controversial Psychosurgery Resulted in a Nobel Prize]
* [http://www.mmaonline.net/publications/MnMed1999/October/El-Hai.cfm Minnesota in the Age of Lobotomy]


Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.

Игры ⚽ Поможем написать курсовую

Look at other dictionaries:

  • James Watts — may refer to:* James Watts (UK politician), Conservative Member of Parliament for Manchester Moss Side 1959 ndash;1961 * James W. Watts, American neurosurgeon and colleague of Walter Freeman;See also* James Watt (1736 ndash;1819), Scottish… …   Wikipedia

  • James Watt — (Gemälde von Henry Howard, um 1797) …   Deutsch Wikipedia

  • James I of England and religious issues — James VI and I (James Stuart) (June 19, 1566 – March 27, 1625), King of Scots, King of England, and King of Ireland, faced many complicated religious challenges during his reigns in Scotland and England. In Scotland, he inherited a developing… …   Wikipedia

  • James Sherard — (1 November 1666 [Tilmouth, James Sherard, an English Amateur Composer , 315. Webb gives a birthdate of 1 July but Tilmouth writes that the register of births at Thurnby church in Leicestershire gives the date of 1 November.] – 12 February 1738)… …   Wikipedia

  • James Alton McDivitt — James McDivitt Land (Behörde): USA (NASA) Datum der Auswahl: 17. September 1962 (2. NASA Gruppe) Anzahl der Raumflüge: 2 Start erster Raumflug …   Deutsch Wikipedia

  • James Elisha Folsom Sr. — James Elisha Folsom Sr., auch bekannt als Big Jim , (* 9. Oktober 1908 im Coffee County, Alabama; † 21. November 1987 in Cullman, Alabama) war ein US amerikanischer Politiker (Demokratische Partei) und der 45. Gouverneur von Alabama.… …   Deutsch Wikipedia

  • James Irwin — Land (Behörde): USA (NASA) Datum der Auswahl: 4. April 1966 (5. NASA Gruppe) Anzahl der Raumflüge: 1 Start e …   Deutsch Wikipedia

  • James A. A. Pierre — James Alexander Adolphus Pierre (July 18, 1908 – April 22, 1980) was Attorney General of Liberia from 1964 to 1971 then Chief Justice from 1971 until his death in 1980. He was born in Hartford, Grand Bassa County in Liberia on July 18, 1908, unto …   Wikipedia

  • James Vann — (February 1768 ndash; February 19, 1809), half Cherokee, half Scottish, was the son of a fur trader surnamed Vann (James, Clement, or John Joseph; various sources name a different brother) and the Cherokee Wah Li. He was born on Spring Place in… …   Wikipedia

  • James Naismith — James A. Naismith Naismith circa 1900 Sport(s) College basketball Current position Title Head coach; Athletic Director Team …   Wikipedia

Share the article and excerpts

Direct link
Do a right-click on the link above
and select “Copy Link”