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Read to Section of Surgery and Anatomy of the American Medical Association, May, 1884.
The proposition to ligate the vertebral artery for epilepsy has not met with great favor among surgeons, and the scanty literature upon the subject leaves its value a matter of uncertainty. I offer the following case, not as decisively proving the usefulness of the operation, but as a contribution toward the collection of facts necessary to the decision of the question. Mr.—, at the age of 17 received a very severe and afflicting mental shock, which was followed by epilepsy. The paroxysms increased in frequency until his mental powers were wrecked. He was in a state of thorough insanity, and from that cause added to the great frequency of the fits, had to be cared for in a state of virtual confinement. Five years later, at the age of twenty-two, he was brought to me in