Staunton vindicator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1860-1896, 1889-12-06
TINsLEY & MORTON, Proprietors,
FRIDAY MORNING. DEC. 6, 1889.
THE RIGHT SOLUTION.


There are four State Asylums for the in
sane in Virginia, in which are confined
both male and female patients. In two of
these, elections will take place to fill the va
cant places of assistant physicians. One of
these elections will take place to-day at the
Staunton Asylum, and the other takes place
ON January LIST at the Williamsburg Asy-
lum. How shall these places be filled
For long time, and for many rea-
sons, there has been a strong public senti-
ment in Virginia regarding the best mode
of treatment of the female patients in our
Asylums. This sentiment has been spur
red into activity and reinforced in strength
by increased public knowledge of these i'll
stitutions, until the time has come when it
must be responded to by those in whose
hands the State has placed the control of
them. That increased public knowledge
has come to the fathers, husbands and
brothers of the State in a shape and in a
way that has aroused the feeling that for the
highest delicacy of treatment of female
patients and the highest efficiency in be-
half of their health, there should be at least
One physician of that sex in each Asylum.
It is no reflection on either the delicacy OF
knowledge of a male physician to say that
it is impossible in many cases that he can
render to the female insane as much help
as aneducated physician of their own SEX
There is delicacy in the minds of women,
often intensified and made morbid by in
sanity, which constitutes an impossible
barrier between the male physician and the
patient, and prevents his obtaining infor-
NATION that to render aid he should have.
The more knowledge the public gets in this
matter the more insistent will be the de-
mand that there shall be some one of their
own sex who shall be on their own side of
this impossible barrier and with whom in
sane women will freely communicate.
Against the imperative necessity for a
woman physician there can be no argument
nor fact presented that will weaken it.
We presume that there will not be found
at this enlightened period any one who will
set up the claim that women do not make
excellent physicians for the insane. If il
should be, it is demolished in advance, for
the cold fact stands that in many of the
Asylums in the country they are among
the most efficient of the medical staff. One
of these Asylums is, as we know,
located in our neighboring State OF
West Virginia, where there has been a
competent female physician for severa
years. In other asylums, located at what
are regarded as the fountain heads
medical science in America Philadelphia.
New York and elsewhere, female physlc-
ians are found. So, any doubt about
, their ability to do the work. is solved by tn,
conclusive fact that they do it, and do il
successfully, where anything short of sue
cess would be promptly noted.
Their success not only answers the ques
ton of their ability, but answers all tn,
opposition to putting them in our own asy
lums. If women physicians have been put
in the Asylums of other States and then
introduction was found beneficial to the
patients, the same result wW foIlOW IN
Virginia. We presume there is no radical
difference between an insane virginia.
and an insane person IN any other State.
Certain it is, that the time has come to
try it in response to the demand Of a strong
public sentiment. Once tried we have NJ
fear of it's failure.
We trust the Board at the W. L. ASy
lum will take the lead in this greatly needed
change and give the helpless women in thai
institution the benefit of the first effor
that has been made specially in behalf O,
the sex. They can easily elect a femal,
physician who shall act under that expert
enced and able friend and helper of the in
sane, Dr.. E. c. Fisher, who has for man!
years had the female department there
under his charge, and they can at the Ell Of
the year congratulate themselves on the re
suit of a delicate public trust wisely an(
humanely discharged.
Since writing the above We find the fol
lowing in the columns of our esteemed
contemporary the Lynchburg Virgimian:
1.-The Staunton VINDIcAToR seems to favor
the appointment of a female assistant physc-
ian on the medical staff of the Western Luna
tic Asylum. This is a yankee" innovation
that Old Virginia is not likely to adopt we
awhile, at least A few years ago an efforl
was made by correspondence with some of th'
female colleges of the North, with the view
of employing female doctor on the staff o
one of our asylums, which resulted in ''col-
ored lady graduate being highly recommend .
ed for the position. This knocked the fat in
the fire. and nothing more has been heard
of it since"
1t is not alone the Staunton VINDICAToR,
but the delicacy that exists in the minds OF
the hundreds of men in Virginia who have
female relatives in the insane asvlums, anG
the intelligent sentiment of thousands OF
other men who have no such sad interest
in these asylums, that ''seems to favor tho
appointment of a female assistant physician
on the medical Staff of all the institutions
where the patients are of both sexes. Again.
a female physician is not a ''Y ankee limo
yation,' but an innovation Of Humanity
and Science, which are broader than al
Yankeedom OF even than that almost Him
liable territory, blind prejudice.
We are more familiar with ''the effort
tain female physician we expect, than our
contemporary is. 1t developed the fact
that there are female physicians in the fol
lowing State Asylums: Iowa-Mt. Pleas
ant; Pennsylvania Harrisburg, Philadel-
phia, Morristown, Danville and Warren;
Massachusetts-Dan Worcester, Taun-
ton, Northampton New York-Black-
well S Island, Hart S Island; West Virgin
ia-Weston. The single name of colored