Food for the soul: Italian woman, 60, prepares stuffed olives while undergoing brain surgery
- Woman, 60, prepared 90 olives in under an hour while she underwent surgery
- Allowed surgeons to calibrate their intricate work as they operated on her brain
- Dr. Trignani, head of Neurosurgery Department, said operation went ‘very well’
An Italian woman prepared stuffed olives while she underwent brain surgery.
Her actions allowed the surgeons to calibrate their work as they operated on the patient’s left temporal lobe, which controls language and complex movements on the right side of the body.
The complex surgery lasted two and a half hours and involved 11 different medical staff at the Neurosurgery Department at the Azienda Ospedali Riuniti in Ancona, central Italy.
An Italian woman prepared stuffed olives while she underwent brain surgery, pictured above
Surgeons, a psychologist, and several nurses carried out the operation as the woman, 60, prepared 90 olives in under an hour.
Stuffed olives, or ‘olive ascolane’, is a traditional Italian aperitif.
Dr. Roberto Trignani, head of the Neurosurgery Department at the hospital, said the operation went ‘very well’.
Trignani has performed around 60 operations with patients ‘awake’ and engaged in other activities over the past five years.
However this was the first time he performed an operation while the patient prepared olives.
It comes after a patient at King’s College Hospital in London played the violin while surgeons operated on her brain to remove a tumour.
Dagmar Turner, 53, played the violin so surgeons could ensure parts of the brain which control hand movements and coordination were not damaged during the intricate procedure.