Eduard Hitzig, neurophysiologist and psychiatrist

Abstract

Eduard Hitzig (1838-1907) may have been an autocratic, proud and mettlesome psychiatrist, but his pioneer work in using electrical stimulation changed utterly the approach to research into the localization of function in the cerebral hemispheres. The ablation techniques of the anatomists and the clinical observations of the neurologists were complemented by a novel method of examining motor control. If Hitzig was vain he had much to be vain about.