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
The remarkable feature of this case is the complete lack of any
emotional shock. The total genesis seems to have consisted in the
prolonged exposure to wet and cold, and the heavy marching. The
tremors, limited to the right upper extremity, occurred without
any demonstrable psychic or bodily trouble, and set in after the
disappearance of the so-called rheumatic disorder. Although there is
no one psychogenic factor to single out, the psychic influencibility
of the case is unmistakable; moreover, the incompleteness of the cure
is doubtless, according to Binswanger, a matter of the imperfect
suggestive therapy employed.
Fever patient watches barrage coming: unconsciousness, paraplegia:
recovery.
=Case 240.= (MANN, June, 1915.)
A lieutenant was lying with fever in a farmhouse in upper Alsace,
watching from his window the shelling of a battery about 400 meters
away. He saw that the enemy was to reach the farm with shell in due
course of time. The shells came nearer, say up to about 100 meters, and
the lieutenant was able to reckon closely when he would be reached. He
was quite defenseless and unable to get to safety. At the very moment,
he thinks, when the shells began to strike the house, the lieutenant
lost consciousness from fear. He was unconscious an hour before
being carried to the cellar. The shelling lasted several hours more.
Immediately upon coming to the patient found that, although he bore no
external wound, both legs and the right arm were paralyzed.
There were never any signs of organic disorder. The patient recovered
completely with purely suggestive treatment.
Incentives to paraplegia.
=Case 241.= (RUSSEL, August, 1917.)
A young Canadian paid $150 to have his teeth repaired to be accepted
for service and then married. The wife became pregnant. He reported
sick after falling out on a route march in a heavy rainstorm. The
medical officer said he had weak feet and ankles. He lay around the
huts, was excused duty, and got worse in the wet and cold. He was
admitted to hospital and came to Russel’s wards on a stretcher showing
paralysis of both legs with slight power of movement at the knee.
Stroking anesthesia to pin prick from the knee down. Reflexes not
abnormal. He walked back upstairs!
According to Russel the wife’s pregnancy had furnished a sufficient
incentive, and the M. O.’s suggestion had fallen on fertile soil.
[Illustration: CAMPTOCORMIA (MLLE. ROSANOFF-SALOFF)
WOUNDED SEPTEMBER 3, 1914. THROWN INTO AIR BY SHELL-BURST;
UNCONSCIOUS. FEBRUARY, 1915: PLASTER JACKET, 3 WEEKS; SECOND
JACKET, 3 WEEKS. CURED. SENT TO GRAND-PALAIS.]
Bullet wound of back: Hysterical bent-back--camptocormia.
=Case 242.= (SOUQUES, February, 1915.)
A man was wounded September 6, 1914, by a bullet that entered along
the axillary border of the scapula and emerged near the spine. He spat
blood for several days; but the skin wounds quickly healed.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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