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- Published on: 22 October 2024
- Published on: 22 October 2024On first looking into Warren’s eponyms.
It is such a pleasure to read Prof Warren’s paper, “Neurological Eponyms? Take Your Pick.” In a journal renowned for offering neurologists both scholarly entertainment and useful data, his contribution is an exemplar.
Prof Warren’s eloquent account, which modestly acknowledges earlier forays into the debate “Eponyms good or bad?”, presents a pastiche, historiography and statistical overview of a neurological subset, and proposes a definition of the ideal eponym, which, I suggest, might henceforth be known as ‘The Warren criteria.’
The table of more than 170 eponyms (I did not tally them myself) sets a precedent as the largest in our journal’s history. I shall send it to my amanuensis to assist with the typography of dictation – a process Prof Warren highlights as hazardous for their correct use.
The content promises many rabbit holes to tempt ventures in idle moments. As a starter, I could not resist looking up Brueghel syndrome, and his painting of a yawning older man, eyes closed. Unsure of the distinction from Meige’s syndrome, which also fails the Warren criteria as unhelpful, the literature soon reveals splitters advocating both eponyms be preserved.
What of Williams Hurst’s acute haemorrhagic encephalomyelitis and a second New Zealander for this roll of honour, William Alexander - whose leukodystrophy with Rosenthal fibres (yet another eponym) bears his name? No doubt others will lament missing individuals, as the author warns.
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None declared.