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MENTAL DISORDER IN SCOTLAND.
868
ophthalmia, the establishment of uniform methods average of 546 mental defective patients at the twoof recording tests, and the interchange of ophthalmo- institutions ; in 1919 the number had r’sen to 1680 in 14 institutions. It is this certification of mental logical literature. ____
a different Act that accounts-and than accounts, in the opinion of the Board-for under the THE twelfth annual report1 of the General Board the diminished number of cases registered Act. A census of all the mental defectives of Control for Scotland shows that the problems before Lunacy the country showed that there were last the Scottish Commissioners are very similar to those throughout from those 2 year 12,969 registered persons. minds of the their English colleagues.2 under the control of the educationApart occupying authorities there The first subject discussed is the early treatment of I a total number of 2202 who had not been mental disorder and the necessity of providing was who come under the statutory certified and did not facilities for voluntary admission to mental hospitals. of the Board, and there is a waiting list of We have noted in previous issues the obstacle which powers the institutions. The boarding-out system 250 for certain parish councils have opposed to scientific to be working satisfactorily. When comappears advance by their refusal to forego the Government the on mental is made between paragraph parison grant allowed for certified patients. As long ago as defectives in this report and the anxiety expressed 1890, however, the parish council of Glasgow the English commissioners the doubt arises whether inaugurated hospital wards for the treatment of by Scotland is yet fully aware of the gravity of her mental temporary and incipient mental disorder, and their deficiency problem. has been councils followed by the of Govan, example On Jan. lst, 1926, there was in Scotland a total of Paisley, and Dundee. It is interesting to note that 18,537 insane persons under cognisance, an increase of the observation wards at Duke-street and Stobhill 139 the during year. Only 597 voluntary boarders (Glasgow) have done such good work that the erection of a third asylum for the district has not been con- were in residence on the same date. The death-rate sidered necessary. Although there are only 160 beds, for the year was 8-6 per cent. The report does not 1176 patients were admitted during last year and less discuss the problem of nursing, but leaves its readers than a third of these were eventually certified. The to deduce the state of affairs from the bald facts that 1020 attendants and servants resigned during the year provision of out-patient clinics, which is being pushed (being 93 less than the year before), 134 left without with such vigour in England and Wales, is still very 41 were dismissed for incompetence, and notice, in Scotland. The General inadequate Glasgow 98 for misconduct. Dispensary and Western Infirmary are the only clinics at present in existence, but one is to be established at "DOCTOR ’MY BOOK.’" the Royal Infirmary, Edinburgh. Scotland, like other treatment has found that has countries, open-air THIS is the somewhat enigmatic title of a play by reduced the high incidence of tuberculous infection Mr. Rudolph Cordova, collaborating with his wife. among mental patients by one-quarter. who writes as Miss Alicia Ramsey, which is a feature On the whole it must be admitted that Scottish of the current issue of the Tailer, and is published in mental hospitals are behind the southern ones in the connexion with the press movement during the past " extent to which they have been hospitalised " -at week in support of the funds of St. Bartholomew’ft all events in name ; the retention of the words Hospital. If the title is difficult to understand there " " " asylum " and lunatic in this report and through- is nothing obscure about the play. It is a series of out the country is an indication that there is yet dialogues between the great Abernethy ahd a succession much to be done. Very few district institutions have of patients and their friends who consult him, the a visiting specialist staff ; some are even run without dialogues being constructed to illustrate, as their a resident medical officer at all, while others have common object, the great man’s known character and inadequate medical or nursing staffs. No reference is notorious eccentricities. The types of Abernethy’s made to any system of discharge on trial or money visitors, therefore, have been selected to form obviously grants. Nevertheless, as a rule the Board have been dramatic contrasts, and to permit the introduction of supported in their efforts by the district boards and familiar anecdotes displaying Abernethy’s brusqueness medical officers. Many institutions now have properly towards those who magnified their trifling ailments, equipped dental rooms and a visiting dentist; some of and extreme kindness and generosity towards those the larger ones have ultra-violet light and hydro- who could ill afford his fees. The aptness of many of therapeutic installations. The report suggests that the episodes will be recognised by medical men as these expensive plants, and also clinical laboratories, founded on much of the medical history of the time, should be established only in certain accessible centres in which bulks so largely; but we do not Abernethy and at the expense of groups of district boards. The know what the authority may be for attributing to problem of occupational therapy is dealt with in the Abernethy himself habits of gluttony, though the first place, naturally, by providing work in the hospital humour is obvious, from the playwright’s point of grounds. Twenty-two of the district asylums have view, of allocating such personal habits to the great farms, and the Board have suggested that every public prophet of the ills which follow upon abuses of institution should have a minimum of one acre to the intestinal tract. Undoubtedly the play should each male patient. For those who cannot be employed arouse the interest of a wide public in the prosperity in farm or garden the Brabazon Society continues its of the institution where Abernethy, the prime great valuable work. The ladies who belong to this society exponent of John Hunter’s revolution of surgical visit the hospital once a week to instruct the patients, so long reigned paramount, and the reprooutlook, and occupational therapy has also been established in duction of Lawrence’s famous portrait of Abernethy,. asylums where there are no voluntary workers. It is which hangs in the hall of the hospital, is a striking one now possible for all public authorities to send their considering its scale. cases of encephalitis lethargica to Stobhill, where special treatment and research can be carried out. RADIUM THERAPY OF CANCER OF THE In a 15-years’ review of the statistics the Board a not real out an but decrease in CERVIX. point apparent certified persons. The discharge- and death-rates have THE attitude of most surgeons at the present time not appreciably altered in the three quinquennial to the use of radium in the treatment of carcinoma of a there on the is, whole, striking uniformity the cervix was recently defined by Mr. T. G Stevens periods, and in the statistics, except for an increase in the death-rate in THE LANCET (Oct. 9th, p. 769). They hold that during the war. This reflects the sensitiveness of radium applications should be reserved for clinically asylum patients to the mental and physical stress of inoperable or borderline cases, in the belief that war conditions. From 1910 to 1914 there was an extended panhysterectomy gives better results in operable conditions. He went on to point out that 1 H.M. Stat. Office, 1926, pp. 48. 2s. 2 there are no data yet available to confirm or disprove THE LANCET, Sept. 11th, p. 557.
defectives under
MENTAL DISORDER
IN
SCOTLAND.
more
____
____
ophthalmia, the establishment of uniform methods average of 546 mental defective patients at the twoof recording tests, and the interchange of ophthalmo- institutions ; in 1919 the number had r’sen to 1680 in 14 institutions. It is this certification of mental logical literature. ____
a different Act that accounts-and than accounts, in the opinion of the Board-for under the THE twelfth annual report1 of the General Board the diminished number of cases registered Act. A census of all the mental defectives of Control for Scotland shows that the problems before Lunacy the country showed that there were last the Scottish Commissioners are very similar to those throughout from those 2 year 12,969 registered persons. minds of the their English colleagues.2 under the control of the educationApart occupying authorities there The first subject discussed is the early treatment of I a total number of 2202 who had not been mental disorder and the necessity of providing was who come under the statutory certified and did not facilities for voluntary admission to mental hospitals. of the Board, and there is a waiting list of We have noted in previous issues the obstacle which powers the institutions. The boarding-out system 250 for certain parish councils have opposed to scientific to be working satisfactorily. When comappears advance by their refusal to forego the Government the on mental is made between paragraph parison grant allowed for certified patients. As long ago as defectives in this report and the anxiety expressed 1890, however, the parish council of Glasgow the English commissioners the doubt arises whether inaugurated hospital wards for the treatment of by Scotland is yet fully aware of the gravity of her mental temporary and incipient mental disorder, and their deficiency problem. has been councils followed by the of Govan, example On Jan. lst, 1926, there was in Scotland a total of Paisley, and Dundee. It is interesting to note that 18,537 insane persons under cognisance, an increase of the observation wards at Duke-street and Stobhill 139 the during year. Only 597 voluntary boarders (Glasgow) have done such good work that the erection of a third asylum for the district has not been con- were in residence on the same date. The death-rate sidered necessary. Although there are only 160 beds, for the year was 8-6 per cent. The report does not 1176 patients were admitted during last year and less discuss the problem of nursing, but leaves its readers than a third of these were eventually certified. The to deduce the state of affairs from the bald facts that 1020 attendants and servants resigned during the year provision of out-patient clinics, which is being pushed (being 93 less than the year before), 134 left without with such vigour in England and Wales, is still very 41 were dismissed for incompetence, and notice, in Scotland. The General inadequate Glasgow 98 for misconduct. Dispensary and Western Infirmary are the only clinics at present in existence, but one is to be established at "DOCTOR ’MY BOOK.’" the Royal Infirmary, Edinburgh. Scotland, like other treatment has found that has countries, open-air THIS is the somewhat enigmatic title of a play by reduced the high incidence of tuberculous infection Mr. Rudolph Cordova, collaborating with his wife. among mental patients by one-quarter. who writes as Miss Alicia Ramsey, which is a feature On the whole it must be admitted that Scottish of the current issue of the Tailer, and is published in mental hospitals are behind the southern ones in the connexion with the press movement during the past " extent to which they have been hospitalised " -at week in support of the funds of St. Bartholomew’ft all events in name ; the retention of the words Hospital. If the title is difficult to understand there " " " asylum " and lunatic in this report and through- is nothing obscure about the play. It is a series of out the country is an indication that there is yet dialogues between the great Abernethy ahd a succession much to be done. Very few district institutions have of patients and their friends who consult him, the a visiting specialist staff ; some are even run without dialogues being constructed to illustrate, as their a resident medical officer at all, while others have common object, the great man’s known character and inadequate medical or nursing staffs. No reference is notorious eccentricities. The types of Abernethy’s made to any system of discharge on trial or money visitors, therefore, have been selected to form obviously grants. Nevertheless, as a rule the Board have been dramatic contrasts, and to permit the introduction of supported in their efforts by the district boards and familiar anecdotes displaying Abernethy’s brusqueness medical officers. Many institutions now have properly towards those who magnified their trifling ailments, equipped dental rooms and a visiting dentist; some of and extreme kindness and generosity towards those the larger ones have ultra-violet light and hydro- who could ill afford his fees. The aptness of many of therapeutic installations. The report suggests that the episodes will be recognised by medical men as these expensive plants, and also clinical laboratories, founded on much of the medical history of the time, should be established only in certain accessible centres in which bulks so largely; but we do not Abernethy and at the expense of groups of district boards. The know what the authority may be for attributing to problem of occupational therapy is dealt with in the Abernethy himself habits of gluttony, though the first place, naturally, by providing work in the hospital humour is obvious, from the playwright’s point of grounds. Twenty-two of the district asylums have view, of allocating such personal habits to the great farms, and the Board have suggested that every public prophet of the ills which follow upon abuses of institution should have a minimum of one acre to the intestinal tract. Undoubtedly the play should each male patient. For those who cannot be employed arouse the interest of a wide public in the prosperity in farm or garden the Brabazon Society continues its of the institution where Abernethy, the prime great valuable work. The ladies who belong to this society exponent of John Hunter’s revolution of surgical visit the hospital once a week to instruct the patients, so long reigned paramount, and the reprooutlook, and occupational therapy has also been established in duction of Lawrence’s famous portrait of Abernethy,. asylums where there are no voluntary workers. It is which hangs in the hall of the hospital, is a striking one now possible for all public authorities to send their considering its scale. cases of encephalitis lethargica to Stobhill, where special treatment and research can be carried out. RADIUM THERAPY OF CANCER OF THE In a 15-years’ review of the statistics the Board a not real out an but decrease in CERVIX. point apparent certified persons. The discharge- and death-rates have THE attitude of most surgeons at the present time not appreciably altered in the three quinquennial to the use of radium in the treatment of carcinoma of a there on the is, whole, striking uniformity the cervix was recently defined by Mr. T. G Stevens periods, and in the statistics, except for an increase in the death-rate in THE LANCET (Oct. 9th, p. 769). They hold that during the war. This reflects the sensitiveness of radium applications should be reserved for clinically asylum patients to the mental and physical stress of inoperable or borderline cases, in the belief that war conditions. From 1910 to 1914 there was an extended panhysterectomy gives better results in operable conditions. He went on to point out that 1 H.M. Stat. Office, 1926, pp. 48. 2s. 2 there are no data yet available to confirm or disprove THE LANCET, Sept. 11th, p. 557.
defectives under
MENTAL DISORDER
IN
SCOTLAND.
more
____
____