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John Hughlings Jackson
John Hughlings Jackson (4 April 1835 – 7 October 1911) was an English neurologist. He is best known for his research on epilepsy.
He was born at Providence Green, Green Hammerton, near Harrogate, Yorkshire, the youngest son of Samuel Jackson, a brewer and yeoman who owned and farmed his land, and Sarah Jackson (née Hughlings), the daughter of a Welsh revenue collector. His mother died just over a year after giving birth to him. He had three brothers and a sister; his brothers emigrated to New Zealand and his sister married a physician. He was educated at Tadcaster, Yorkshire and Nailsworth, Gloucestershire before attending the York Medical and Surgical School. After qualifying at St Barts in 1856 he became house physician to the York Dispensary.[citation needed]
In 1859 he returned to London to work at the Metropolitan Free Hospital and the London Hospital. In 1862 he was appointed Assistant Physician, later (1869) full Physician at the National Hospital for Paralysis and Epilepsy located in Queen Square, London (now the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery) as well as Physician (1874) at the London Hospital. During this period he established his reputation as a neurologist. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1878.
Jackson died in London on 7 October 1911 and was buried on the western side of Highgate Cemetery. He was an atheist. The Hull York Medical School building at the University of York is named in his honour.
Jackson was an innovative thinker and a prolific writer. He is best remembered for his contributions to the diagnosis and understanding of epilepsy. His name is attached eponymously to the characteristic "march" (The Jacksonian March) of symptoms in focal motor seizures and to the "dreamy state" of psychomotor seizures of temporal lobe origin. His papers on the latter variety of epilepsy have remained relevant due to their descriptive clinical detail and analysis of the relationship of psychomotor epilepsy to various patterns of pathological automatism and other mental and behavioural disorders.
Jackson also did research on aphasia, noting that some aphasic children were able to sing, even though they had lost the power of voluntary speech. He also studied what types of language loss was found in patients with left-brain injury, including set phrases, such as "Good bye" and "Oh, dear."
In his youth Jackson had been interested in conceptual issues and it is believed that in 1859 he contemplated the idea of abandoning medicine for philosophy. Thus, an important part of his work concerned the evolutionary organization of the nervous system for which he proposed three levels: a lower, a middle, and a higher. At the lowest level, movements were to be represented in their least complex form; such centres lie in the medulla and spinal cord. The middle level consists of the so-called motor area of the cortex, and the highest motor levels are found in the prefrontal area.
The higher centres inhibited the lower ones and hence lesions thereat caused 'negative' symptoms (due to an absence of function). 'Positive' symptoms were caused by the functional release of the lower centres. This process Jackson called 'dissolution', a term he borrowed from Herbert Spencer. The 'positive-negative' distinction he took from Sir John Reynolds.
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John Hughlings Jackson
John Hughlings Jackson (4 April 1835 – 7 October 1911) was an English neurologist. He is best known for his research on epilepsy.
He was born at Providence Green, Green Hammerton, near Harrogate, Yorkshire, the youngest son of Samuel Jackson, a brewer and yeoman who owned and farmed his land, and Sarah Jackson (née Hughlings), the daughter of a Welsh revenue collector. His mother died just over a year after giving birth to him. He had three brothers and a sister; his brothers emigrated to New Zealand and his sister married a physician. He was educated at Tadcaster, Yorkshire and Nailsworth, Gloucestershire before attending the York Medical and Surgical School. After qualifying at St Barts in 1856 he became house physician to the York Dispensary.[citation needed]
In 1859 he returned to London to work at the Metropolitan Free Hospital and the London Hospital. In 1862 he was appointed Assistant Physician, later (1869) full Physician at the National Hospital for Paralysis and Epilepsy located in Queen Square, London (now the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery) as well as Physician (1874) at the London Hospital. During this period he established his reputation as a neurologist. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1878.
Jackson died in London on 7 October 1911 and was buried on the western side of Highgate Cemetery. He was an atheist. The Hull York Medical School building at the University of York is named in his honour.
Jackson was an innovative thinker and a prolific writer. He is best remembered for his contributions to the diagnosis and understanding of epilepsy. His name is attached eponymously to the characteristic "march" (The Jacksonian March) of symptoms in focal motor seizures and to the "dreamy state" of psychomotor seizures of temporal lobe origin. His papers on the latter variety of epilepsy have remained relevant due to their descriptive clinical detail and analysis of the relationship of psychomotor epilepsy to various patterns of pathological automatism and other mental and behavioural disorders.
Jackson also did research on aphasia, noting that some aphasic children were able to sing, even though they had lost the power of voluntary speech. He also studied what types of language loss was found in patients with left-brain injury, including set phrases, such as "Good bye" and "Oh, dear."
In his youth Jackson had been interested in conceptual issues and it is believed that in 1859 he contemplated the idea of abandoning medicine for philosophy. Thus, an important part of his work concerned the evolutionary organization of the nervous system for which he proposed three levels: a lower, a middle, and a higher. At the lowest level, movements were to be represented in their least complex form; such centres lie in the medulla and spinal cord. The middle level consists of the so-called motor area of the cortex, and the highest motor levels are found in the prefrontal area.
The higher centres inhibited the lower ones and hence lesions thereat caused 'negative' symptoms (due to an absence of function). 'Positive' symptoms were caused by the functional release of the lower centres. This process Jackson called 'dissolution', a term he borrowed from Herbert Spencer. The 'positive-negative' distinction he took from Sir John Reynolds.
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