Shell-shock and other neuropsychiatric problems : $b Presented in five hundred and eighty-nine case histories from the war literature, 1914-1918Southard, Elmer Ernest
History
Shell-shock and other neuropsychiatric problems : $b Presented in five hundred and eighty-nine case histories from the war literature, 1914-1918
Southard, Elmer Ernest
War neuroses; World War, 1914-1918 -- Medical care; World War, 1914-1918 -- Psychological aspects
Perhaps the author may permit the introducer a little liberty of
comment. His non-English interpellations, especially Latin and French,
may be regarded by some as overdone or perhaps pedantic, but are rather
piquant, giving zest to the text. _Diagnosis per exclusionem in ordine_
is sonorous and has a scholarly flavor, but does not prevent the reader
who lives beyond the faubourgs of Boston from understanding that the
author is speaking of an ancient and well-tried method of differential
diagnosis. _Passim_ may be more impressive or thought-fixing than
its English translation, but this to the reader will simply prove
a matter of individual opinion. _Psychopathia martialis_ is not
only mouth-filling like _Senegambia_ or _Mesopotamia_, but really
has a claim to appreciation through its evident applicability. It
is agreeable to note that the book seems nowhere to indicate that
_psychopathia sexualis_ and _psychopathia martialis_ are convertible
terms.
The bibliography of the volume challenges admiration because of its
magnitude and thoroughness and is largely to be credited, as the author
indicates, to the energy and efficiency of Sergeant Norman Fenton, who
did the work in connection with the Neuropsychiatric Training School
at Boston, resorting first-hand to the Boston Medical Library and the
Library of the New York Academy of Medicine. After Sergeant Fenton
joined the American Expeditionary Force, Dr. Southard greatly increased
the value of the bibliography by his personal efforts.
This bibliography covers not only the 589 case histories of the book,
but it goes beyond this, especially in the presentation of references
for 1917, 1918, and even 1919. Owing to the time when our country
entered the war, American references are, in the main, of later date
than the case histories. They will be found none the less of value to
the student of neuropsychiatric problems.
The references in the bibliography number in all more than two
thousand, distributed so far as nationalities are concerned about
as given below, although some mistakes may have crept into this
enumeration for various reasons, like the publication of the same
articles in the journals of different countries. The list of references
includes French, 895; British (English and Colonial), 396; Italian,
77; Russian, 100; American, 253; Spanish, 5; Dutch, 5; Scandinavian,
5; and Austrian and German, 476. It will be seen, therefore, that the
bibliography covers in number nearly four times the collected case
studies, most of these records being from reports made during the first
three years of the war. The author has wisely made an effort to bring
the bibliographic work up to and partially including 1919.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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