TREATMENT OF INSANITY

Press, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22375, 12 April 1938, Page 15

TREATMENT OF INSANITY

SUCCESSFUL TESTS WITH INSULIN SERUM AMERICAN DOCTOR HOPEFUL (FMM ASIOCIACTOB TBLKIBAM.) AUCKLAND, April 11. New hope for the insane by the use of insulin diabetic serum was described by a well-known San Francisco physician, Dr. John K. Plinez, when he arrived in Auckland on the German liner Reliance, on a world tour. He explained that the methods formed what was known as shock treatment, but the results, particularly in minor forms of insanity, had been particularly successful. A cable message from Vancouver, published early in February, mentioned that the use of the serum was reported to have produced a startling improvement in the condition of patients in a provincial hospital. Experiments were conducted with 20 patients, of whom eight were cured and 80 per cent, of the rest improved. Heavy doses of insulin produced a diabetic-like coma, from which the patients were revived by feeding them with sugar. "Excellent results have* been obtained from insulin treatment in the United States, particularly in cases of dementia praecox, and it has practically displaced the inoculation of patients with malaria, a method which was first enunciated by Professor Jauregg, of Vienna, about 15 years ago," Dr. Plinez said. "The treatment can be. used in all cases, and .the aim is no produce a condition of insulin shock and (seduce the quantity of sugar in the blood to a minimum." It was a drastic method, he continued, as a condition of delirium had to be introduced in the patient, but it was being widely applied in American mental hospitals with distinct success, the percentage of cures being considerable. In fact, a large number of men and women previously regarded as hopeless cases had been discharged from institutions able to resume their normal occupations. At least the results gave an indication that a cure and not a palliative had been found, and there seemed to be a scientific alternative to the mere durance which had previously been the lot of the mentally afflicted. .