We the king bassist and YouTube celebrityCharles Trippyrecently uploaded to YouTube a telecasting of his brain surgery . This is an amazingly powerful matter to watch and I commend taking the fourth dimension to do so if you have any interest in the genius and/or medicine that you watch over it .
It ’s not an easy viewing though , so I warn you .
I came across this television on reddit , andI require a shot at explaining the procedure and contingent over there . Most of what I ’ve learn is from my research ( for instance ,A , B , C ) in working with brain surgeon , neurologists , and the unbelievable patient role who undergo these operation .
The full text of that discourse is below .
Okay I ’m gon na take a whack at explicate what ’s decease on here for people who are concerned . Note that I ’m not a medical doctor , but I ’m pretty sure most of what I ’m about to say is correct to a first idea . I ’ll fixate any errors as I or others spot them .
Why ’s he alive ? Why are they asking him to move his hands ? clobber like that .
Before I explicate anything though , can I just say how damn amazing this is ? Like , allow ’s all take a moment to step back and recognize that a person , who would have been much bad off otherwise , put his biography in the hands of a few extremely skilled hoi polloi and some astonishing technology and let them open his skull and off something from his mental capacity . I ’ve seen this many , many times , but it ’s good to just call back how astonishing of a clip we live in even though we do n’t have flying cars or jet pack or whatever . Every day people ’s lives are saved by aesculapian technology like this .
Also , Mr. Trippy ’s a pretty amazing guy for volunteer to divvy up this with the world . I do n’t think people appreciate this stuff enough . Good on you man . I ’d lie with to use this television when I instruct .
On to the details . From this image here you may see that the tumour is in his ripe frontal lobe :
The image I ’ve circled show the tumour - related hyperintensity ( bright sinlessness ) on a t2 - weighted MRI , which allows you to distinguish tissue paper from fluids . In t2 - weight MRI , water is brighter . This particular kind of tumor makes the blood - brain roadblock more permeable and therefore the region around it has more water and thus is brighter .
Note that I say the tumor is in the correct one-half of his brain , but the tumour in the MRI image looks like it ’s in the left . That ’s because brain doctor “ flip ” the MRIs so that impart is correct and vice versa . purportedly it ’s mirrored because that what the Doctor of the Church sees when they ’re looking at the affected role .
Anyway , the fact that the tumor is in the back part of his right frontal lobe means that it ’s cheeseparing to the parts of the brain that check the heftiness in the left one-half of his body . That is , the right motor cerebral mantle part of your brain innervate the musculus on the left side of your body and vice versa .
The reason the Doctor keep saying stuff like “ critical to move right now ” and “ how ’s your hand doing there ? ” is because they want to minimize the possibility of cutting salubrious mentality tissue paper in his motor cortex . Neurosurgeons have a specific term for parts of the wit dealing with movement , actor’s line , vision , and sensation . They call these regions “ eloquent cortex ” , and they ’re very disquieted about damaging them … otherwise hoi polloi could end up paralytic , blind , or ineffective to speak or understand speech .
So they ’re really watch out him very cautiously , and that ’s why he ’s awake . They ’re making certain he ’s moving his hand just okay .
Given the location of the neoplasm , prior to his surgery they probably did what ’s call a “ wada test ” to see if his lyric functions are localise to the left or correct cerebral hemisphere of his brainpower . If he ’s powerful handed , as a male he ’s catch a 99 % or so probability of oral communication social occasion being in his left hemisphere , but normally surgeons check to make absolutely sure ( correct - handed womanhood are about 95 % left - hemisphere spoken communication dominant ) . operational brain imaging ( EEG , fMRI , MEG ) just is n’t quite good enough on a individual person for surgeons to really be 100 % positive . Whereas the effects of the wada test are … well … pretty conclusive .
The wada test is essentially using a barbiturate interject directly into the brain via the carotid arteria to put half the brain to log Z’s . If they inject the barbiturate into the left over hemisphere of your brain , and you ’re allow for hemisphere spoken language rife , then … well you ’ll find funky for a while and have some words payoff .
I ’ve only half - jokingly asked my neurosurg protagonist to do this to me just to see what it feel like . obviously “ do no harm ” and ethics and stuff and nonsense , so no go so far .
Oh ! Right at the beginning of the TV a woman says “ you ’ll find a pinch and burn ” . I ’m jolly sure she ’s doing a local anesthetic to the skin to numb it so they can roll in the hay the stereotactic frame into his skull . This allow them keep all of their instruments right positioned and still even though he ’s awake , verbalise , and moving around a niggling .
That ’s all I can think of for now . If anyone notices anything that I did n’t address and they ’re curious about , ask me . If I do n’t know , I ’ll bug my neurosurg friends and update this C. W. Post with answers .
Image : Shutterstock / bikeriderlondon
This postwas originally publish onOscillatory Thoughts , a neuroscience blog write byBradley Voytek , PhD , Professor of Cognitive Science and Neurosciences , UC San Diego . you may come after Dr. Voytek onTwitter here .
This posthas been republished with license .
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