New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1921-07-13
Neglect of Mentally Disabled Soldiers
D Thomas W. Salmon Points Out the Government
Has Provided This State and the Relatively Simple Means Bringing Relief
To the Editor Of The Tribune.

To the Editor Of The Tribune.
[ Sir: In testifying before the Senate
committee last Wednesday regarding
the neglect Of ex-service men suffer
ing from mental disorders apparently
gave the impression that the 400 sui
cides in the whole country among dis
charged soldiers had occurred in New
York State. This Is not the case, but
the tragic consequences of neglecting
mental diseases, WHICH I was endeaver-
| ing to place before the Senate COM
mittee, are sufficiently emphasized by
New York's own proportion of this bat
talon Of young ex-service men who
preferred death at their own hands to
life.
1t did not require the training of
psychiatrist to appreciate the necessity
of making provision for mentally dis
abied ex-service men. Every one who
had sons or young friends in the serv-
ice has been struck by the abnormal
emotional states which follow the war
and interiors with the resumption of
peace-time activities. The restlessness.
encouragement, depression and irrita-
bility characterizing these conditions
are familiar to all.
Cases for Diagnosis
Discharged men who are having such
difficulties, but are nevertheless mas
tering them, represent one end of the
scale of postwar mental casualties.
while the stream Of insanity that is
now entering hospitals from the metro
polltan district at the rate of five
day represents the other. Between
these two extremes lie many problems
In which sympathy and understanding
and, above all, the prompt application
Of skilled diagnosis and treatment will
determine whether the outcome is to
be minor mental disorder or one of
the grave types of insanity.
Ne1u York's Need Greatest
Few people realize the pitifql made
quacy of the facilities that the govern
ment has provided in this state to meet
a need that could have been accurately
foreseen while conveys Of the mentally
disabled were still returning from
France. Lack of hospitals throughout
the country is distressing enough, but
IN this state it is greatest.
In Chicago an observation hospital
OF ninety-seven beds is set aside by the
Public Health Service for the reception.
study and classification of mental pa
tients. Boston has a Public Health
Services rreuro-psychiatric hospital Of
zzo beds at West Roxbury, and, through
contracts, the excellent facilities Of the
Boston Psychopathic Hospital are avail
able. A special Public Health Service
neuro-psychiatric hospital of 400 beds
is provided in Philadelphia. New
Orleans has reception and an obser-
walton hospital Of eighty beds.
In this great state, that furnished
number of soldiers equal to The
strength of fifteen divisions, there are
no beds at all for the continued care
OF mental patients in government hos
pitfalls, and the only observation facili-
ties consist of few beds set apart at
Fox Hills and the Marine Hospital at
Stapleton that constitute way stations
for patients going through the courts
to the nearest state hospital for the
insane. For the border line case-the
man who needs encouragement, pleas
ant surroundings and skilled treatment
there ts nothing. unless he IL willing