IORAL SCIENCES DOI 10.1002/jhbsBONNIE EVANS AND EDGAR JONESExactly half of all patients given thyroid extract in the 1923?927 sample were diagnosed with forms of melancholia or depression (11 out of 22). In 1931, 62.5 percent of patients treated only with thyroid extract were diagnosed with melancholia or depression. In 1935, the percentage drops a little to 47.4 percent, although this can be explained by the fact that a larger majority of the patients were children (Evans, Rahman, Jones, 2008). Children were sometimes treated with thyroid for conditions such as amentia (lack of mind) and mental deficiency and this was not the case with adults (e.g., CFM 151.645). The fact that Maudsley doctors consistently gave thyroid extract for the treatment of melancholia and depression throughout the 1920s and 1930s suggests that they considered it was an effective treatment for these conditions. If one looks further at the cases given other diagnoses, yet treated with thyroid, they are also often reported to have depressive symptoms (CFM 008.156). Many patients from the 1930s diagnosed with “dementia praecox” and “schizophrenia” were also described as having depressive and melancholic symptoms. Doctors frequently reported successes in treating depression and depressive states with pure thyroid gland. As the 1930s progressed, further research was conducted on the use of thyroid to treat mental disorder. In 1933, Dr. M. A. Brazier, a researcher attached to Golla’s laboratory, secured a grant from the Medical Research Council to investigate the “electrical impedance angle in disorders of the thyroid and psychoses” (Jones Rahman, 2009, p. 278).8 In the following year the MRC granted Golla ?0 a year toward the salary of Dr. Florence M. Grant to work on “the effects of the buy MK-5172 pituitary thyrotropic hormone in cases of involutional melancholia and other psychoses.”9 In 1929, R. G. Hoskins, Director of Research at The Memorial Foundation of Neuro-Endocrine Research, Worchester, Massachusetts, and F. H. Sleeper, FT011 custom synthesis assistant superintendent of the Worchester State Hospital, had reported that from a series of 80 patients presenting at their hospital with “dementia praecox,” 14 had shown evidence of thyroid deficiency. When treated with thyroid preparations, the patients were all reported to have shown marked mental improvements and four were reported to be completely cured (Hoskins Sleeper, 1929b). Building upon Pierre Janet’s work on “psychasthenia,” Hoskins and Sleeper claimed that the patients suffered from a lack of nervous energy which resulted in a flight from reality. Janet’s conception of the sense of reality, and how this could be lost, derived from a long line of research that he had conducted on patients in Le Havre from 1883 to 1889 and later the renowned Salp^ tri` re hospital in Paris. La perte de la fonction du r?el was a disturbance e e e of thought that was present in all psychasthenics, and which resulted from their inability to pay attention to different aspects of mental life. As Janet understood it, the function of reality was a synthesis of all psychological functions ranging from automatic functions taking place at the level of the nervous system up to complex thoughts and actions. The combination of attention to one’s will or volont?in conjunction with an awareness of external reality formed the e synthetic operation of presentification, the formation of the present moment in the mind. Janet drew from the work of the English sociologi.IORAL SCIENCES DOI 10.1002/jhbsBONNIE EVANS AND EDGAR JONESExactly half of all patients given thyroid extract in the 1923?927 sample were diagnosed with forms of melancholia or depression (11 out of 22). In 1931, 62.5 percent of patients treated only with thyroid extract were diagnosed with melancholia or depression. In 1935, the percentage drops a little to 47.4 percent, although this can be explained by the fact that a larger majority of the patients were children (Evans, Rahman, Jones, 2008). Children were sometimes treated with thyroid for conditions such as amentia (lack of mind) and mental deficiency and this was not the case with adults (e.g., CFM 151.645). The fact that Maudsley doctors consistently gave thyroid extract for the treatment of melancholia and depression throughout the 1920s and 1930s suggests that they considered it was an effective treatment for these conditions. If one looks further at the cases given other diagnoses, yet treated with thyroid, they are also often reported to have depressive symptoms (CFM 008.156). Many patients from the 1930s diagnosed with “dementia praecox” and “schizophrenia” were also described as having depressive and melancholic symptoms. Doctors frequently reported successes in treating depression and depressive states with pure thyroid gland. As the 1930s progressed, further research was conducted on the use of thyroid to treat mental disorder. In 1933, Dr. M. A. Brazier, a researcher attached to Golla’s laboratory, secured a grant from the Medical Research Council to investigate the “electrical impedance angle in disorders of the thyroid and psychoses” (Jones Rahman, 2009, p. 278).8 In the following year the MRC granted Golla ?0 a year toward the salary of Dr. Florence M. Grant to work on “the effects of the pituitary thyrotropic hormone in cases of involutional melancholia and other psychoses.”9 In 1929, R. G. Hoskins, Director of Research at The Memorial Foundation of Neuro-Endocrine Research, Worchester, Massachusetts, and F. H. Sleeper, assistant superintendent of the Worchester State Hospital, had reported that from a series of 80 patients presenting at their hospital with “dementia praecox,” 14 had shown evidence of thyroid deficiency. When treated with thyroid preparations, the patients were all reported to have shown marked mental improvements and four were reported to be completely cured (Hoskins Sleeper, 1929b). Building upon Pierre Janet’s work on “psychasthenia,” Hoskins and Sleeper claimed that the patients suffered from a lack of nervous energy which resulted in a flight from reality. Janet’s conception of the sense of reality, and how this could be lost, derived from a long line of research that he had conducted on patients in Le Havre from 1883 to 1889 and later the renowned Salp^ tri` re hospital in Paris. La perte de la fonction du r?el was a disturbance e e e of thought that was present in all psychasthenics, and which resulted from their inability to pay attention to different aspects of mental life. As Janet understood it, the function of reality was a synthesis of all psychological functions ranging from automatic functions taking place at the level of the nervous system up to complex thoughts and actions. The combination of attention to one’s will or volont?in conjunction with an awareness of external reality formed the e synthetic operation of presentification, the formation of the present moment in the mind. Janet drew from the work of the English sociologi.
