Lobotomies were performed on a wide scale in the 1940s, with one doctor, Walter J. Freeman II, performing more than 3,500 by the late 1960s. The practice fell out of favour in the mid-1950s, when less extreme mental health treatments like antidepressants and antipsychotics came into use.

When was lobotomy banned?

Before his death in 1972, Dr. Walter Freeman performed transorbital lobotomies on some 2,500 patients in 23 states. Read a brief history of Dr. Walter Freeman and lobotomies.

Are lobotomies ever still performed?

Lobotomy is rarely, if ever, performed today, and if it is, "it's a much more elegant procedure," Lerner said. "You're not going in with an ice pick and monkeying around." The removal of specific brain areas (psychosurgery) is reserved for treating patients for whom all other treatments have failed.