Salomón Hakim
Salomón Hakim Dow (4 June 1922 – 5 May 2011) was a Colombian neurosurgeon, researcher, and inventor. A descendant of Lebanese immigrants, he is known for his work on neurosurgery and for the precursor of the modern valve treatment for hydrocephalus. Early life Although his parents wanted him to learn how to play any musical instrument, Hakim instead showed interest and curiosity for science in his early childhood, especially physics and electricity. It is said that he locked himself in his room to make electric circuits and build radios at the age of 12. He finished high school at Colegio Mayor de San Bartolomé, in Bogotá, Colombia. At 22 years of age, Hakim started medical school at Universidad Nacional in Bogotá, but his passion for electricity continued and led him to perform research in electrical output during digestion, the effects of low voltage on womb contraction, and the calcium formation stimulation by electrolysis. He later travelled to the United States to continue his medical studies in Neurosurgery in 1950, and Neuropathology in 1954. Career and normal-pressure hydrocephalus During his Research fellowship, Dr. Hakim performed autopsies of Alzheimer Disease patients and with other degenerative diseases of the central nervous system (CNS). He noted that the majority of the cases their brain ventricles were enlarged without destruction of the brain cortex. However, nobody was able to explain the reason why, which led Hakim's curiosity to research more back in Colombia. In 1957, he finally realized that these patients had what is now known as normal pressure hydrocephalus (NPH) after finding a 16-year-old live patient with this condition. He published his work in 1964 and called Dr. Raymond Adams to share his discovery, but Adams rejected his idea. Months later, a US consular employee in Colombia suffering from the same condition came to his practice. Hakim proposed to treat him by taking some cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) as he had treated the young patient. But skeptically, the family rejected it and wanted to go back to the United States for treatment. Hakim, convinced that nobody would be able to treat her there, decided to fly with them. At the Massachusetts General Hospital, he treated the patient, who had a sudden incredible improvement. After seeing this, Dr. Adams got interested in Hakim's work and published Dr. Hakim's discovery, taking some of the credit for this amazing finding. This concept of NPH opened the door to other research including the treatment of dementia in the elderly. Hakim continued working on NPH and for many years he has researched the mechanics of the intracranial cavity and CSF. Unidirectional valve The first valve to treat hydrocephalus was introduced in 1949 by Spitz, but this valve had several disadvantages which sometimes risked the patient's life. Knowing this and working in his home shop in Bogotá, Hakim improved and developed a unidirectional valve with the capacity to regulate the CSF pressure by adding a spring pressure control in a stainless steel cone and synthetic ruby ball. This valve was much