Brain Tumors: symptoms, types, a man who hunts them (and what drives him) and a vivid video of the removal of one.
posted by Brandon Blatcher on Dec 4, 2011 - 23 comments

Sgt. Wells's New Skull. In the epidemic of brain injuries coming out of the war, Army neurosurgeons had never seen someone survive such a devastating wound. But Brian Wells jokes that he just left part of his head in Iraq. Someday, he says, he'll have to go back and get it.
posted by srboisvert on Mar 15, 2007 - 21 comments

Living with half a brain - hemispherectomy, probably the most radical procedure in neurosurgery
posted by Gyan on Jun 29, 2006 - 50 comments

The strange story of Henry M. Henry was able to hold information in storage for very short periods of time. Most people can retain about seven pieces of information (a telephone number, for example) in memory for about thirty seconds, and Henry scored normally on these kinds of tasks. Thus, his working memory (or scratch-pad memory) seemed unaffected by the loss of his hippocampus. The main problem for Henry was converting short-term memories into permanent storage, a process called consolidation. Henry's case is one of the most studied brain-damage cases [PDF] ever. A fascinating story about one man's struggle with brain surgery.
posted by KevinSkomsvold on Jan 25, 2006 - 17 comments