Evening star., 1939-07-16
Public Health Service Advances
In New Attack on Mental Ills
Undertakes Study of Hospital Procedure With
View of Spreading Modern Therapv to
Hundreds of Thousands of Afflicted
BY James Free

For the first time in long and dis
tinguished history of public health serv-
ice to its citizens, the Federal Govern
ment today has an agency available on
a full-time basis for study of mental
hospital procedures and for promotion
of. modern therapy and diagnosis of
mental disease.
The United States Public Health Serv-
ice this month has taken under it's wing
the work begun three years ago by the
Mental Hospital Survey Committee, a
cooperative organization of national
medical interests. The new Federal
unit is called the Section on Mental
Hospital Methods. 1t is attached to the
Division of Mental Hygiene and has
offices in the National Institute of
Health, TWenty-fifth and E streets NV
Importance of such research group
may be appreciated more readily if one
ponders the following authoritative
statements:
"One out of every 20 adults Tin the
United States) will at some time in their
lives be confined to mental hospital -
DR.. H. M. Pollock, statistician, New York
State Department of Mental Hygiene.
One Per Cent Incapacitated.
e.. On any given day nearly per
cent of our population, about 1900, 900
people, are incapacitated by mental
disease, mental defect, epilepsy or other
types of mental illness" Joseph Zubin
former assistant psychologist, United
States Public Health Service and
statistician for the Mental Hospital
Survey Committee
I'm 1886 one out of every $50 persons
was at some time or other a patient in
mental hospital Gin the United States.
The investment in mental hospitals in
the United States is approximately
00,0O00 900, and the annual cost of
maintaining these institutions is around
100000, ,000."-Dr Winfred Overholser,
superintendent of st. Elizabeths Hospi-
tai and professor of psychiatry at the
George Washington University School of
Medicine
Since its formulation in 1886, the
Mental Hospital Survey Committee has
made detailed on-the-spot studies of 1863
mental hospitals in 40 States. While in
many instances the States bore the cost
OF surveys of their institutions, activities
OF the committee have been supported
in the main, by the Rockefeller Founda-
ton, the American Psychiatric Associa-
,tion and the Public Health Service. The
technical skill that the committee
RI re Ic ca1f -,
its membership-consist of repre-
sentatives of the American Psychiatric
Association, the American Neurological
Association, the American Medical As
sociation, the American Board of Psy-
chiatry and Neurology, the National
Committee for Mental Hygiene, the
United States Public Health Service, the
Canadian National Committee for Mental
Hygiene and the Canadian Medical AS
Sociation.
Though its research projects, the COM
mittee hoped to bring about a more uni
form distribution of facilities for early
recognition and treatment of mental all
mentS. And number of States, includ-
ing Virginia, are in the process of re-
organizing tnef mental hospital SetupS
in conformity with recommendations of
the committee.
Educational Aspects Enlarged.
Not only will incomplete research prof.
ects of the committee be continued by
the section on mental hospital methods,
but, thanks to Government printing
facilities, issuance of educational PAM
phlets will be possible on larger scale.
The new section, to be headed by DR..
Grover A. Kempf OF the Public Health
Service, who has been associate medical
director of the Mental Hospital Survey
Committee, consists of two medical Off
GERS and three assistants.
On the list of publications the section
expects to issue within the next year.