Approximately 20% of all injuries on the Western Front were to the head, neck and face
At the start of WW1, injuries to the brain were almost always fatal. Very few doctors had experience of neurosurgery and infection in the head was very common and difficult to stop,
An American neurosurgeon called HarveyCushing developed new techniques
He experimented with the use of magnets to remove metalfragments from the brain.
He used localanaesthetic instead of using general anaesthetic to put people to sleep in order to prevent the brain from swelling
Cushing operated on 45 patients in 1917 and 71% survived, compared to less than 50% before WW1
