MEDICAL SURFARI; NEXT WEEK IS BRAIN AWARENESS WEEK

Despite enormous advances in neuroscience, our understanding of the basic brain functions and their importance to the individual and humanity were known well and revealed by Hippocrates, the father of medicine, in his eloquent description more than 2,000 years ago.

Men ought to know that from the brain and from the brain only, arise our pleasures, joys, laughter and jest as well as our sorrows, pains, griefs and tears. Through it, in particular, we think, see, hear and distinguish the ugly from the beautiful, the bad from the good, the pleasant from the unpleasant. It is the same thing which makes us mad or delirious, inspires us with dread and fear, whether by night or day, brings sleeplessness, inopportune mistakes, aimless anxieties, absent-mindedness and acts that are contrary to habit. These things that we suffer all come from the brain when it is not healthy, but becomes abnormally hot, cold, moist or dry or suffers any other unnatural affection to which it was not accustomed.

Madness comes from moistness. When the brain is abnormally moist, of necessity it moves and when it moves neither sight nor hearing are still, but we see or hear now one thing and now another, and the tongue speaks in accordance with the things seen and heard on occasion. But all the time the brain is still, a man can think properly.

Clearly, the brain is more than an amorphous mass of insubstantial electricity -- it is the bower of human communication and guidance. Its care is the neurologist's and neurosurgeon's venue as, by virtue of our knowledge, training and experience, we have been entrusted as guardians of the highest level of intelligence known to man.

Headaches, seizures, multiple sclerosis, cerebral aneurysms, brain and spinal tumors and other complex neurological maladies require the unique application of our art and science for each individual.

Although it has become nearly unfashionable and almost priggish to talk about virtues, the virtues of self-discipline, compassion, responsibility, courage, perseverance, honesty, loyalty and faith are integral to our lives.

These immutable basics are the heart and soul of the medical profession and we must not allow technology, delivery systems, governments or businesses with compromised ethics to diminish their importance.

Next week has been dedicated as Brain Awareness Week, a time to be mindful about protecting the organ of your mind, your brain, and to recognize its importance in your life as your guidance system. Use it for its highest and best purpose.

World Wide Web Resources Brain Awareness Week 2000: Home Page www.sfn.org/BAW/ This site, sponsored by the Society for Neuroscience, provides information about Brain Awareness Week activities as well as facts about the brain and nervous system and current research.

Home Page for Brain Awareness Week www.dana.org/brainweek/welcome.cfm The Dana Alliance for Brain Initiatives sponsors this Web site, that provides information, puzzles, graphics and education resources aimed at advancing the public awareness about the progress, promise, and benefits of brain research.