Egas Moniz, Antonio Caeteno de Abreu Freire (1874-1955)

Portuguese neurosurgeon and politician who was awarded a Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine in 1949 for determining the therapeutic value of prefrontal leucotomy in certain psychoses.

In 1935, he performed a surgical technique to isolate the frontal lobes from the brain by injecting the connecting white matter with alcohol. This was done in patients suffering from acute emotional tension or mental disorders, such as schizophrenia, that had proved incurable. Later, he took the bold step of cutting through the connecting white matter. This operation, prefrontal lobotomy, was actually within the substance of the brain and was a very delicate procedure. It found favour at the time, but has since fallen into disrepute due to its unpleasant long-term side-effects.

Egas Moniz was born in Avanca, Portugal, and graduated in medicine from Lisbon University, where he later returned to become professor of neurology in 1911. He rose to fame in his country as a politician in the period 1903-18, reaching the position of foreign minister before returning to his work as a surgeon in Lisbon.