Conference of Officers in Charge of Government Hospitals Serving Veterans of the World War — John Shaqi
Conference of Officers in Charge of Government Hospitals Serving Veterans of the World War
History
Conference of Officers in Charge of Government Hospitals Serving Veterans of the World War
Medicine, Military; Military hospitals; World War, 1914-1918 -- Veterans -- Medical care -- United States
The third group of neuropsychiatry cases is like the second,—a group
that has always been with us, but unlike the second it is a group that
never before has been systematically hospitalized. It is the group of
what might broadly be termed borderland states, comprising all sorts of
types of defective, delinquent, psychopathic, neurotic, and mildly
psychotic individuals. Whereas they perhaps present no new problems when
one is speaking from the platform of neuropsychiatry, they do present a
distinctly new group of problems from the standpoint of hospitalization.
Here all the agencies which have been described in connection with the
second group need to be brought into action, but beyond them there needs
to be a definite intensive study of methods for the new hospital
problems involved. I mention only one aspect of the problem because it
is one which has forced itself repeatedly upon the attention of hospital
authorities and that is the need for an intelligent, and I may say, a
therapeutic utilization of discipline in dealing with these cases, in
this group there very probably are contained a reasonable number of
individuals of unusual equipment, who, if our ingenuity and our breadth
of vision are great enough, may perhaps be saved for some work of more
than ordinary usefulness.
One of the medical agencies which it is contemplated to bring to bear
upon this third group of neuropsychiatry cases is the dispensary because
it is recognized that there is actual danger in hospitalizing a certain
proportion of this group, and therefore it is much better to deal with
them as ambulant cases. They can be dealt with in the dispensaries which
are equipped not only to take care of them, but for all other medical
and surgical conditions, and so will get the very best possible
attention. There should, however, be connected with these dispensaries,
especially the larger ones in the more densely populated districts, a
psychiatrist with psychotherapeutic training who should have a
psychiatric social worker to help him. If there are enough patients to
warrant it perhaps additional assistance might be needed.
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