✓Anatomical and physiological understandings of the structure and function of the brain have worked to establish it as the “seat of the soul.” As an organ of reflection, meditation, and memory, the brain becomes synonymous with what defines the “self” through the existence of consciousness—of mind. Thus, the brain has been associated with a range of transcendent concepts—the soul, spirit, mind, and consciousness—that all relate in fundamental ways to each other both in terms of their perceived location within the brain and because of the way each works ultimately to define the person to whom the brain belongs. In this article, the author provides a brief exploration of how interrelated these categories have been when seen in the context of ancient, Renaissance, early modern, and modern philosophical and medical concerns; how the brain has variously been perceived as home to these intimate states of being; and how practitioners from the neurosciences have reflected on these questions. The author provides novel insights into the interrelationships of philosophy, theology, and medicine by examining these issues through the lens of the history of neuroscience.
The impact of variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD) on the clinical practice of haemophilia in the UK is coloured by the haemophilia community's experience of hepatitis C virus and human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) transmission via plasma-derived therapies in the 1980s, when the delay in recognizing and acting on the potential risks cost many patients their lives and left others to manage another chronic disease. This crisis prompted organisations such as the United Kingdom Haemophilia Centre Doctors' Organisation to advocate for the introduction of haemophilia therapies that would not be susceptible to contamination with blood-borne pathogens. After the identification of vCJD in 1996, a number of public health measures were taken in response to a government-sponsored vCJD risk assessment, and following reports of transfusion-transmission of vCJD, additional guidelines have been developed to prevent person-to-person transmission, some of which may impact the quality and availability of medical and surgical care. Variant CJD has had a significant negative effect on the UK haemophilia community, shaking patient confidence in the therapies they have received over the last 21 years, affecting the quality of care and creating the risk of stigmatizing the community as it was in the 1980s. As with HIV and vCJD, emerging blood-borne infectious agents will likely affect blood and blood-derived therapies well before we become aware of its presence. As a result, only therapies with the lowest level of risk should be used for care of patients with haemophilia.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.