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Wilder Graves Penfield

“The brain is the organ of destiny. It holds within its humming mechanism secrets that will determine the future of the human race.”

Dr. Wilder Graves Penfield was one of Canada's foremost neurosurgeons. Two deep passions marked hislife. The first was a desire to understand the cause of brain illnesses, and the other was a devotion to family; both his immediate family, andmembers of his extended professional family from around the world, including hiscolleagues fromthe Montreal Neurological Institute (The Neuro).

Early Years

Wilder Penfield was born in 1891 in Spokane, Washington, where he lived until the age of eight. In 1899, he and his mother, sisterand older brother moved back to Hudson, Wisconsin. They left his father in Spokane to try to re-establish hismedical practice. In1905,his mother opened a private school in Hudson that not only became Penfield’s school but the family home as well.

When Penfieldwas 13,his mother learned of the newly established Rhodes Scholarship and Penfield spent the next several years preparing to become one of its recipients.He attendedPrinceton University, largely due to the fact that it is in thesmall state of New Jersey, and at the time,Rhodes Scholarships were awarded on a state-by-state basis. Besides being a good student at university, he excelled in sports and was named class president and voted "best all-round man" by his classmates. His mother attended his graduation in 1913, and they traveled up the Hudson River, across Lake George and Lake Champlain to Montreal-the first time Penfieldwould visitthe city that would become so important in his life. While at Princeton, Penfielddecided to pursue medicine likehis grandfather and estranged fatherbefore him. He received a Rhodes Scholarship in 1914, and started his Oxford studies at Merton College the following year.

University and Medical Training

At Oxford, Penfield met two great medical teachers who would becomemajor influences inhis life: renowned British neurophysiologist, Sir Charles Sherrington, who first introduced him to the study of the brain, and Sir William Osler, an eminent Canadian professor who was serving as the Regius Professor of Medicine.Penfield sentWilliam Oslera letter of introduction, andLady Osler invited him to tea. It would bethe first of many meetings, and the beginnings of a blossoming friendship.With so many men away at war, Oxford had few medical students. As a result, Penfield had the opportunity to befriend Charles Sherrington,who was knighted in 1922 and received aNobel Prize in 1932.Penfield wrote about Sherrington,“…he described to us the unsolved mysteries of neurology that were beckoning to him…”

Penfield spent his summer vacation of 1915 serving at a Red Cross hospital in France. It became his first medical experience, and the time wherein his fascination with the art ofsurgery began to flourish. On his way to France for another period of service in 1916, his ship - theSS Sussex, an American vessel - wastorpedoed by the Germans.

A set of eighteenth century surgical tools

Penfieldwas injured, but was rescued. He recuperated at the Osler home. Following the incident, there were premature reports to thepress of his death, and one newspaper erroneously printed hisobituary!Penfield was later compensated by the German government and used the money to buy a farm on Lake Memphremagog in Quebec’s Eastern Townships, which became his family’s escape from the city.

After Oxford, Penfield completed his MD at Johns Hopkins University. He interned under Harvey Cushing in Boston at Peter Brent Brigham Hospital. After his internship, he continued practicing surgery for seven years at theNew York Presbyterian Hospital. His time at the hospital was challenging, as he was faced with the limitations of available surgical procedures and discouraged by the death of several of his patients. His first surgical patient was a boy with a brain tumour – a tumour that was too deep to risk removal by surgery. Penfield was forced to tell the boy’s parents that he could not be saved. He added, however, “I may be wrong. Doctor’s are wrong sometimes, you know?” He had resolved then to never remove all hope.

“Men and women in a darkened room will look at a light, however tiny, and they may even live by it.”

The disillusionment he faced in his work as a surgeon led Penfield to return to research. He traveled to Spain to learn nerve cell staining techniques, and to Germany tolearn surgical techniques that he would use later to treat his own patients.For two years, he studied the causes of epilepsy as well as contemporary surgical methods – lessons that would soon form the foundation of his groundbreaking work at the soon-to-be Montreal Neurological Institute.

The Montreal Neurological Institute and Hospital

Penfield'sdriving missionwas to establish a neurological institute, where surgeons, laboratory researchers, physiologists and all scientists in the field of neurology could work together and share their knowledge. After a decade of fundraising and grant writing, he established the Montreal Neurological Institute (the Neuro) in 1934, thanks to a substantial grant fromthe Rockefeller Foundation and financial support from the government of Quebec, the city of Montréal, and private philanthropists. The Neuro soon established itself as the centre fortraining, research,and treatment ofnervous system and brain disorders. He was the Neuro's first director, and he remained director until 1960.

Penfield and his colleagues published their findings about a method of surgerythat would become known as "the Montreal procedure" in 1952.The procedure enabledsurgeons to operate on the brains of epileptic patients anddestroythe cells where seizures originated.The doctors used local anesthetics so they couldstimulate parts of the brain using electricity, and the patients could describe the sensations that were triggered bythatstimulation. This helped doctors to identify andeliminate areas of the brain that produced seizures. Thanksto the success of the Montreal procedure, Penfield and his colleagues discovered a lot about the human brain, including which areasproduced certain thoughts, and how memories were stored. For example, one woman, who suffered from epileptic seizures, reported smelling burnt toast before having a seizure.As demonstrated in the video below, Penfield attempted to find this area of the brain by asking the woman when she could smell burnt toast while stimulating parts of the brain.

Over the next severalyears, Penfield and his colleagues also developedsophisticatedbehavioraltests for pre- and post-surgicalevaluationand madeseveral other important advances. Penfield retired as Director of the Neuro in 1960.

Later Years

Penfield spent his later yearswriting novels, medical biographies,and articles, travelling the world, lecturing, and participatingin the Neuro activities. Before his death inMontreal in1976, Penfield's writing probed speculatively about the nature of human consciousness and the soul.

As a pioneering clinician and researcher, Penfield was celebrated nationally and internationally for what the Globe and Mail called his "almost miraculous" achievements, but to his patients and fellow health professionals, he was also known for his deep integrity and humanity.

Penfieldwas designated in 1988 as a National Historic Person. In 1994, he was among the inaugural members of the Canadian Medical Hall of Fame. Penfield'sautobiography,No Man Alone, was published followinghis death.

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The Neuro (Montreal Neurological Institute-Hospital)is a bilingual academic healthcare institution. We are aMcGill research and teaching institute; delivering high-quality patient care, as part of the Neuroscience Mission of the 㽶Ƶ Health Centre.We areproud to be a Killam Institution, supported by the Killam Trusts.

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