Trepanning

Throughout time, the methods of trepanning have changed. The first style used obsidian, or other hard stones, to cut rectangular intersects. This eventually evolved into flint scraping. Doctors would take sharp flint and scrape the skull. This method could take up to 50 minutes of scraping as the skull was very think and hard. As time went on, this method was adapted to cut a circular grove in the skull and removing to piece to get direct access to the brain. This method remained for a long time, with the adaptations resulting from better technology, allowing for easier access to reach the brain. This finally evolved into drilling multiple small holes into the skull and chiseling out the piece. (Gross). Out of all of these methods, the last one is the safest option, as it is the easiest way to break through the skull and lead to the least likely chance to damage the brain. It was believed that trepanation could be used for melancholic and schizophrenic patients. Doctors thought that cutting into the skull of patients could allow for the brain to have more room to operate and ease the melancholic ideas out of it. These ideas grew out of the use of MRIs demonstrating how the brain works when a melancholic person is having these depressing thoughts (Faria). Doctors believed that they could watch where the brain was working when a melancholic mind is active, and go in afterwards, using trepanation to alter the brain's way of communicating with the person. Advances of this method are still used in medicine today. There are many medical procedures that utilize the science of breaking open the skull and doing work on the brain. A craniotomy is one of these modern examples of how trepanning has evolved in today's world. This procedure involves cutting a hole in the scalp and creating a hole into the skull to have access to the brain and do whatever needs to be done to the physical brain. While over time this has lost the melancholic implications, this is the most commonly used prescription still used today.