Word: arachnoid
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Dates: during 1930-1939
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During the War surgeons noticed that after head injuries many soldiers developed epilepsy. Dr. Ney and associates, first with the French Red Cross, later the American Expeditionary Forces, observed particularly that where the injury occurred the cortex and three soft coverings of the brain (pia mater, arachnoid membrane, dura mater) adhered to the skull. If during an operation the surgeon pulled at the attached soft parts, the patient on the operating table went into epileptic convulsions. The Ney group judged that the convulsions resulted from the incidental stretching of the cerebral cortex...
...followed that idea through, found that a growth in the coverings of the brain is frequently associated with epilepsy. Small whitish bodies called Pacchionian granulations grow out of the arachnoid (middle) membrane. Dr. Ney's belief is that man's upright posture conditions the growth of Pacchionian granulations. The growths frequently erode, in one direction through the dura mater and into the skull, in the other direction through the pia mater to the brain itself. Their final effect often is to peg the brain to the skull...