The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1914-01-19
TREATING MENTAL DIsE AT HOME.
Important fleagE step In Case Of Insane
IS ". Salmon M D., National Committee
 Mental Hygiene. S$Y n 5
(EsxcluslYe seTyIeesfrhe Survey Press. Bureau B.


 operated as integral parts Of the hos pitals to which they are attached and the physicians, being supplied with all the clinical notes of patients dur ing their. hospital residence, can make treatment absolutely continuous. Un- der such circumstances, many hun dreds of patients can be- sparoled aT1- nually, with the understanding that regular visits. at first frequent--even kdaily-sand later lessa frequent will be made stos the out-patient departments where, the physicians can advise both patients and relatives and closely ob- serve the progress of the mental dis ease These are some of the immediate lofathe state hospitals will meet. : Itsis difficult to predict just what thes future development of the clinic for mental diseases, will be and yet it seems not too visionary to conceive of their growth into mental hygiene institutes in our larger oenters Appropriation in which many cases of mentaI disease Twill be successfully treated without the necessity of removal from their homes.
 E An institute with several depart ments would De capable of dealing much more efficiently with it's cases
 than the ordinary out-patient clinic. It would have examining rooms fully f0aQ1pP6Q~ TOE I0QeEI1 1fpSyCAOiOS1cals S4- taminatiens. occupation rooms with skilled instructors in the manual arts, and facilities for all kinds of special treatment.
 < Beside being a center for the sdiag-s nosis and Seadly treatmento of mental diseases and continued treatment of lconvalescent patients, the mental hy- giene institute would have to meet some very broad social responsibilities. It would be a center for preventive work and. for the education not only fof physicians. nurses and occupation instructors but of social workers in various field teacher and parent- those upon whom preservation of men 1 tai health and recognition of the first tsigns of mental disease must always klarge1y depend To such an institute as to the 9or- adinary menta alsrIinfc, would come from lschools, homes an6ls juvenile courts
 those .tqueer'' and tsdiherents chill Idrens .sS There would also come to the ir1sti- lgent magistrates some. of those indi- l viduals like SchFank in whose defec-
 tive brains political ideas become so l astrangely transformed that they find expression in the assassination of men in public life It is fact that most such peron are thought by friends or IreIatives to be unbalanced but harm less cranks long before they commit 1cr1nes No more striking i1ustra- Itfon Of the present futile means of l 1deaIing with such cases could be found lthan the defective man who murder led a little girl in New York Ia few Innonths ago. He had been. arrested lsome time before For an cfferlse which Ito every psychiatrist plainly disclosed
 his mental state and the probability of
 his final revoIting crime but he was
 dealt with byss the courts, who did not, need the. aid of psychiatrists, and Inc was ignorantly released to follow l the. course which his defective mind
 had inexorably set for him Efforts
 have been made by the state to keep Edown the number in the state hos pita1s by th'e@ deportation of aliens.
 the discharge of non-residents and bother means but the establishment of
 out-patient departments is the first attempt made by the state to deal l with mental diseases before they have
 resulted in admissions to the institu-s I tions- This new plan Of attacking l the problem of mental diseases in the Icommunitfes in which they originate
 marks the end Of long period of inactivity during which the state has fwatched prehensively the rising tide l in it's institutions without making a I single effort to check at their sources: any of the streams which feed it.