The science of treating brain aneurysms, a key component of
neurosurgery, has developed in the last 70 years, says Chris
Taylor ’91, a neurosurgeon on the medical school faculty of the
University of New Mexico. Attempts to treat aneurysms before
1937 often led to the patient’s death, Taylor explained in a
lecture at the Suter Science Center of Eastern Mennonite
University (EMU) during its 2012 Homecoming and Family Weekend.
An aneurysm is a vesicle or envelope in an artery that does not
belong; blood can get in but has no way to escape. Labeled as
apoplexy in the 17th century, the eventual blockage of the blood
vessels leads to strokes, which can eventually cause paralysis
or death. Taylor credited Antonio Egas Moniz, who won a Nobel
Prize in 1949 for his work on computerized tomography, and
Godfrey Hounsfield, co-winner of a Nobel Prize in 1973 for
magnetic resonance imaging, for laying the groundwork for modern
neurosurgical techniques for treating aneurysms. Taylor began
his lecture, titled “A Time Bomb in