MENTAL PATENTS.

Press, Volume LXI, Issue 18309, 17 February 1925, Page 7

MENTAL PATENTS.

*=* METHODS OF TREATMENT.

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LONDON, February 15. Criticisms regarding doping and illtreatment of asylum patients resulted in new regulations being enforced forbidding mechanical means of restraint except simple strait-jackets, gloves, or towels tied over, the beds. ■ The new regulations emphasise that a patient under restraint must never be left unattended. AH medicines administered must be recorded in a special book. [Before the Royal Commission, Mr Montgomery Parker, chairman of the Society for National Lunacy Reform, said that his society knew of cases pf ill-treatment, including pummelling an the stomach, resulting at times in broken ribs. In many cases it was really a battle of wills, and th.e .patients' wills were broken. Ayoscine was administered as a punishment, and also croton oil, the most violent purgative known, which struck terror into the heart of the patients. The dhairman. of the Commission objected to the onesided launguage tof the Society. for Lunacy Reform's memorandum. Ho said that, while it must be admitted that most deplorable incidents had occurred in certain institutions, it Should not go forth to the public that these intolerable conditions were general ia. British asylums.]