SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
3,000yo brain surgery patient likely treated with cannabis, magic mushroom 'painkillers' - study
A Russian researcher has published a new study on a 3,000-year-old medical procedure in which the patient was likely anaesthetized with natural hallucinogens and rhythmic music before the surgeon chiselled into their skull. The study of a Bronze Age man's skull has shed some light into how ancient people of the Krasnoyarsk region in northern Russia treated intracranial diseases.
Published in the International Journal of Osteoarchaeology, the study suggests that mind-bending natural stimulants such as magic mushrooms, cannabis and even the beat of a drum were used to dull the pain caused by primitive surgical instruments. Discovered at the Anzhevsky burial ground last year, the human skull is around 3,000 years old. It features a curious hole to the left parietal lobe, which scientists believe was the result of moderately successful ancient brain surgery, or trepanation.
Dr Sergey Slepchenko, of the Institute of Archaeology and Ethnography in Novosibirsk, told The Siberian Times the patient survived the initial procedure but likely died later from complications during the recovery period. "The surgeon probably stood face-to-face to the patient on the left side. Or the surgeon may have fixed the head with his left arm or between his knees [and] operated with his right hand," Slepchenko said.
[...] "One of the most dangerous complications of trepanation is bleeding which develops immediately after the skin incision," Dr Slepchenko said. "To minimize bleeding and reduce pain, the operation had to be carried out as fast possible by presumably highly-skilled surgeon. It is not clear how they stopped the bleeding."
I loved the title of the article. I didn't realize there were very many 3,000 year old patients, let alone candidates for brain surgery.
Ante Mortem Cranial Trepanation in the Late Bronze Age in Western Siberia (DOI: 10.1002/oa.2543)
(Score: 2) by JNCF on Sunday August 21 2016, @12:21AM
So where did the idea that he died from complications come from?
For that matter, where did the stuff about cannabis and anaesthetic bongos come from?
From the abstract:
Although trepanation was the main cause for the development of the changes noted in the preceding texts, there are no reasons to believe that the subject died from complications arising from infection after trepanation. The patient survived and later died for reasons that may never be determined. Medical necessity was the most likely justification for trepanation. Immersion in altered states of consciousness may also have been a necessary part of the trepanation process as a mode of sedation, along with other shamanic practices, such as consumption of psychotropic substances or ecstatic dance.
I think the claims that he necessarily died from complications, and that psychoactive drugs were used during surgery, are just embelishments by the journalists. The abstract doesn't make these claims, but instead specifically states that they don't know how he died and that psychoactive drugs may have been used.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Sunday August 21 2016, @07:03AM
along with other shamanic practices
So the crazy guy gets his head drilled by a shaman with a sharp rock, and that somehow qualifies a surgery? Sounds like an overdose of delusional moral equivalence to me.
What led them to believe there was any anesthetic involved, real or imagined, with the possible exception of a bunch of bad beer?
Maybe he survived long enough to see some signs of healing around the drilled holes. It still doesn't actually mean much if this guy was a prisoner from another tribe.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by JNCF on Sunday August 21 2016, @04:20PM
So the crazy guy gets his head drilled by a shaman with a sharp rock, and that somehow qualifies a surgery?
Two things:
1) While all we have left to examine is the skull, we might be looking at a hole which was used to access parts of the brain that the shaman removed. This is speculation, but a very real possibility. We could be looking at a primitive precursor to the prefrontal leucotomy. All it takes is one spear-induced mental disability before the whole tribe knows that removing head-meat affects your personality.
2) Some modern trepanation survivors report a different mental state afterwards, comparing it to constantly being somewhat high. Others do not, or they report the effect going away after a relatively short interval. I, unqaulified as I am to even speculate, suspect that this is a placebo and/or some temporary effect caused by brain swelling. Some proponents of trepanation (also unqualified to speculate) instead attribute it to increased levels of blood -- and therefore oxygen -- in the brain. If they are correct and I am wrong, trepanation is a surgery which has has permanent effects on cognition.
What led them to believe there was any anesthetic involved, real or imagined, with the possible exception of a bunch of bad beer?
I'm going to speculate that marijuana was probably discovered before alcohol. Alcohol requires fermentation, whereas marijuana requires fire. I agree that there is a high likelyhood of no anesthetic being used.
(Score: 2) by dry on Monday August 22 2016, @12:13AM
Why do you say that marijuana requires fire? You can eat the raw plant and get pretty high. Fermentation is a process that happens naturally as well, lots of true stories about various animals, ranging from birds to elephants getting drunk on naturally fermenting fruit.
They've both been used for all of history. Just heard someone talking about the evidence of cannabis use all over eastern Asia from about 5000 yrs ago and most all human cultures have had some form of alcohol.
(Score: 2) by JNCF on Tuesday August 23 2016, @09:02PM
Good points.
You can eat the raw plant and get pretty high.
I was unaware of this, but according to Mr. Google it seems to check out. It's still supposed to be way less effective than cooking, but that obviously doesn't matter for this conversation.
Fermentation is a process that happens naturally as well, lots of true stories about various animals, ranging from birds to elephants getting drunk on naturally fermenting fruit.
I was previously aware of this part, which makes my overlooking of it far more embarrassing than the last point; ignorance is more easily cured than stupidity.
They've both been used for all of history.
Just for clarity, I never questioned that fact.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Friday August 26 2016, @07:53AM
This is speculation, but a very real possibility. We could be looking at a primitive precursor to the prefrontal leucotomy.
One wonders. Who volunteers for that? Who would even thing of doing that to someone valued by the tribe?
To me it seems more likely someone took a spear in the head, and people were amazed he survived.
Or maybe it was torture inflicted on an enemy.
But in any case, who in the tribe gets to make that decision that Old Gronk needs a little ventilation?
"Letting out of demons" is as generous a description I can muster.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by JNCF on Friday August 26 2016, @04:21PM
But in any case, who in the tribe gets to make that decision that Old Gronk needs a little ventilation?
The same could be asked about Young Rosemary; [wikipedia.org] in her case, the answer was her father. To me, it doesn't seem unreasonable that prehistoric brain scooping could have been used to pacify individuals who were acting out of line with societal norms -- whether that means being too violent, too sexual, too likely to have strange convulsions, or too whatever else. It may have been a last-ditch effort before execution.
"Letting out of demons" is as generous a description I can muster.
A description doesn't have to be generous to be plausible. But also, I think that might be the sort of terminology that an illiterate shaman would use to describe behavioral modification by means of misunderstood surgery.