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From www.lundissimo.info:

When Jonathan Cole first read an article in Rolling Stone about people who had voluntarily had holes drilled into their skulls, he thought they were crazy.
Today, Cole, a student at City College of New York, has had a 14-millimeter hole in his skull for four years — and he says he would never go back.
Cole, 33, is one of 15 participants (11 men and 4 women) in a pilot study conducted between 2000 and 2002 on this ancient practice called trepanation, organized by the International Trepanation Advocacy Group (ITAG) at a clinic in Monterrey, Mexico. ITAG and the modern proponent of trepanation, Bart Huges, claim that the procedure restores the brain’s blood volume to the level typical of childhood and reduces cerebrospinal fluid. According to ITAG, this leads to increased energy, heightened consciousness, and reduced repression.
The practice dates back hundreds of years: it was performed to relieve brain pressure or for spiritual purposes. Some mystics believed that the hole expelled evil spirits and that creating a “third eye” allowed people to experience life more intensely. Today, however, the procedure — which takes about 15 minutes and is performed under local anesthesia — is viewed with skepticism and disdain by much of the American medical community.
Cole traveled to Monterrey in June 2002 after stumbling upon ITAG’s website. “I was curious; it seemed authentic,” he said. At the time, he was taking antidepressants and wanted to improve the quality of his life.
At the clinic, the procedure (which cost $2,400) was performed using a surgical saw called a trepan. The hole, located on the upper left side of his head, is hidden by his curly black hair, so it is not visible. But, he claims, the benefits certainly are.
“It’s like watching TV with rabbit ears and thinking you have good reception,” he said, referring to his life before trepanation. “Then you hook up the cable and realize how sharp the picture can be.”
Cole and other study participants admit that life after trepanation is not perfect. But Cole said he felt more like his younger self — more willing to take risks, more open to possibilities, and more spiritual. After the trepanation, he left his job as a civil engineer and began studying music, his childhood passion. He also began practicing meditation.
Peter Halvorson, founder and director of ITAG, agreed with his assessment. Halvorson, who claims to be the first American to undergo the procedure voluntarily, drilled his own skull in August 1973 at age 27.
Halvorson and Bill Lyons, one of the study participants (who died in 2002 from causes unrelated to trepanation), performed the procedure on a British woman in Utah. The procedure was shown on ABC’s 20/20 in 2000. Both were charged with practicing medicine without a license, pleaded guilty, and were sentenced to three years’ probation.
Halvorson said the experience was an opportunity to spread knowledge of trepanation, and the woman had agreed to appear publicly. Despite the “sensationalistic” coverage by ABC and the subsequent trial, Halvorson claimed that the episode helped raise awareness of the practice and showed that there were people willing to undergo it.
Halvorson, whose hole appears as a small depression on the top of his head, is determined to demonstrate its scientific value. He said he was collaborating with a Russian neurophysiologist on an animal study to verify whether cerebral circulation changes after the procedure, funding the research with proceeds from his jewelry business.
The results, he announced, would be presented at a neurology conference in St. Louis in July; until then, he remained tight-lipped, except to say that the animal studies had produced positive results. In the meantime, ITAG, based in Philadelphia, suspended sending any new participants to undergo trepanation in Mexico.
“We’re doing this study to determine once and for all if trepanation causes changes, and if so, to make the practice universally available,” he said. “I bet on this horse. I think it will win the race. But if the skeptics are right and it produces no effect, I’ll accept it and move on.”



Robert Lund, 59, from Brooklyn, did not participate in the pilot study, but he ended up with a coin-sized hole in his forehead after an assault in 1996. Doctors did not reconstruct it after removing bone fragments, as there was no medical reason to do so. Lund reasoned that this meant the hole was not harmful.
"They redo your nose, sculpt your cheekbones, redo your breasts," he said. "But if you want a hole in your head, they won’t do it."
Dr. John Mangiardi, head of neurosurgery at Cabrini Medical Center in New York, disputed the idea that a skull hole increases cerebral blood volume or reduces cerebrospinal fluid. He also noted that the body regenerates cerebrospinal fluid three times a day, so any changes observed on scans after surgery could be temporary. He attributed positive effects reported by some participants to the placebo effect—about 30% of people benefit from any treatment, he said. The reason American doctors refuse to perform trepanations, although not illegal, is the lack of evidence and legal risk.
Nevertheless, Lund claimed he experienced the same effects described by others—a feeling of lightness and pleasure, of being more alive than he had been in years. Even if this could have been related to stopping heroin (which he had used for years and continued for six months after the incident), Lund said he felt freer and happier than other ex-addicts he knew.
Lund’s hole is larger and more visible than a typical trepanation, and he said he has seen many people stare in amazement, especially since he shaved his head the previous summer.
"It doesn’t bother me," he said. "Over time you accumulate damage; at least this is interesting. The hole stays there."
Despite his experience, Lund said he would never voluntarily undergo a trepanation.
"To do it, you have to feel something is wrong in your life, an unmet need," he said. "The people who went to Mexico… didn’t seem happy to me."
Halvorson agreed. Like Cole, most volunteers in the study wanted to do more in life but lacked "the energy to go for it," he explained. Many had tried antidepressants or psychological therapies without success. Halvorson said he felt depressed and limited before the trepanation. He had practiced yoga and studied other methods to increase cerebral blood flow. He met Huges and his theory of cerebral blood volume and, since no doctors were willing to perform the procedure at the time, he decided to do it himself.
"It made more sense to have myself trepanned immediately than to wait 40 or 50 years with a brain supplied with less blood," he said. "It made more sense to live at that level right away, rather than waiting for some doctor to tell me it was okay to do it."