Dr. Alfredo Quinones-Hinojosa, associate professor of neurosurgery and oncology at Johns Hopkins University, will be featured on the Wednesday episode of “NOVA scienceNOW” on PBS performing an awake craniotomy. He spoke with The Examiner about the procedure and the show.
What is an awake craniotomy?
I basically performed brain surgery when the patient is awake. There are very few people in the United States who do it and very few patients who tolerate it. It?s usually [performed for] lesions near very important parts of the brain that will be crucial for language generation or language understanding.
How does it feel to operate on an awake patient?
It?s a great deal of responsibility and a great deal of pressure as well. The best way I can describe it is a feeling of exhilaration and excitement and passion and respect for the patient but also for the brain itself, for the wonderful organ nature has created.
It?s that whole combination of determination to get respect, resilience, passion, admiration, and in the end, these patients allow me to learn from them in that relationship. We are partners. We both learn from each other.
That is why they are my heroes. They know they come up and they rise to the occasion. They do it with such an incredible grace and incredible amount of patience.
What was it like being filmed?
It?s an incredibly professional crew, in the background, quietly. They are professionals. To me it?s like they are almost not there.
When I go into the operating room, I become one with the patient. I literally become connected through my hands and my brain and it?s almost as if the world stops there. It?s as if I am a different person.
Do you feel like a celebrity?
It?s hard not to. If I say no, I would be lying through my teeth. I agreed to do this because I want people out there to know there are people who care about brain cancer.
I want this to translate to more research and more funding. It?s the recognition that we can change the awareness of what isgoing on in the field.
