The Dubious Science of Ultrasound

1940's Cure All-Ultrasonics were used in medicine as therapy utilizing it's heating and disruptive effects on animal tissues. Since the 1920's the destructive ability of high intensity ultrasound has been recognized.  Langevin noted destruction of a school of fishes on the sea upon exposure to ultrasound. He then placed his hand in a water tank with high intensity ultrasound, when his hand became painful he realized the potential for medicine, and ultrasound evolved to become a neuro-surgical tool.  In the 1940's William Fry at the University of Illinois and Russell Meyers at the University of Iowa performed craniotomies and used ultrasound to destroy parts of the brain (basal ganglia) in patients with Parkinsonism.  1964, Kisker, George W., The Disorganized Personality.

In 1954 the value of focused ultrasound as a psycho-surgical technique was first demonstrated.  "High frequency sound waves are directed into the brain and focused on particular areas, and lesions are created in a controlled way. The necessity for cutting into the brain is avoided completely.  Focused ultrasound makes it possible to create tissue changes in the subcortex ranging from minimal reversible lesions to larger areas of gross and irreversible damage." Lindstrom,P., Prefrontal Ultrasonic Radiation-A Substitute for Lobotomy, Arch. Neuro, Psychiatry, 1954.

Dr. Peter A. Lindstrom specialized in the use of ultrasound on the prefrontal area of the brain.
Prefrontal Sonic Treatment (PST), consisted of directing an ultrasound beam about 20 millimeters in diameter, through two or three small holes drilled in the skull on the prefrontal area, involving the white matter of the brain tissue. "This is not a true lobotomy procedure, since neither the surface of the brain nor the brain sheets are cut or punctured."  The operation is carried out in two stages, two days apart. As of 1964, Dr. Lindstrom had performed 550 psychosurgical operations via ultrasound.

Also note:  "The National Institute of Mental Health, the federal government agency charged with the guidance of diagnostic and therapeutic research in the field of mental health, categorically declares that psychosurgery is performed in the absence of direct evidence of existing structural disease or damage of the brain." This quote was from 1978, Samuel Chavkin, The Mind Stealers.