Sir Victor HorsleyBorn 14 Apr 1857; died 16 Jul 1916 at age 59.Victor Alexander Haden Horsley was an English physiologist and neurosurgeon who was apioneerin surgery on the brain and spinal cord. Before age 30, on 25 May 1886, he performed his first human brain surgery: excision of a scar. In 1887, he worked with his former professor, Sir William Gowers, in the controversial first surgery to remove a spinal cord tumour, treating an Army officer (age 45) with a spastic paralysis of the lower extremities, enabling him to walk again. He researched thethyroid gland's function in regulating the body's growth and metabolism, and how its malfunction was related to myxedema and cretinism. He confirmed Louis Pasteur's development of an effective rabies vaccine, and advocated its use in England to prevent the disease. In his research to find physiological analogs with humans, he investigated the anatomy as diverse as woodpeckers, ducks and armadillos.« |
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