Hrayr Terzian (1925-1988): a life between experimental neurophysiology and clinical neurology.

Abstract

This article provides a biographic and scientific profile of prof. Hrayr Terzian (Addis Abeba 1925-Verona 1988). In 1966, Terzian was appointed professor of the clinic of nervous and mental diseases in Cagliari, and in 1970 moved to Verona, where until his death he led the Neurology Clinic serving as the first rector of the local university. As a close friend of the psychiatrist Franco Basaglia (1924-1980), Terzian contributed to the reform of the Italian mental health system. His interests and scientific contributions were extremely broad. He was the first to describe the electroencephalographic changes induced by the antipsychotic chlorpromazine and, together with Henri Gastaut (1915-1995) and his wife Yvette, to describe the rolandic arched ("mu") rhythm. He contributed to elucidate the inhibitory mechanisms of the cerebellum on the antigravity postural tone and provided the first description of Klüver-Bucy syndrome in humans. Always attentive to the social and political aspects of medical practice, prof. Terzian achieved outstanding results both in experimental neurophysiology and in clinical neurology. Besides offering a tribute to Hrayr Terzian, this article provides a brief historical overview of the different clinical pictures caused by bilateral temporal lesions: from the first animal observations by Sanger Brown (1852-1928) and sir Edward Albert Sharpey-Schäfer (1850-1935), later confirmed and expanded upon by Heinrich Klüver (1897-1979) and Paul C. Bucy (1904-1992), to the first cases of bitemporal lesions in humans, including that of the famous patient H.M. (Henry Gustav Molaison, 1926-2008).