At age six, Katherine Hawker had a quarter of her brain removed.

"It was an experimental procedure at the time," her mum Maggie Steffan said.

"Katherine was only the fourth person in the world to have it done."

The procedure, a frontal lobectomy, was done in 1983 to try to stop epileptic seizures. She'd been having 70 to 80 seizures a day.

"It usually involves taking off a little bit of the brain," Ms Steffan said. The surgery is still done today.

"Wally Lewis had it done for epilepsy. It can be successful in stopping seizures," she said.

It didn't work for Katherine. The surgeons removed the front right section of her brain, which caused her to have a stroke. She became weak on the left and her learning was restricted. "If she didn't have medication, she'd have uncontrollable

See Full Page