NEW HOPE

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 80, Issue 86, 12 April 1938, Page 8

NEW HOPE

TREATMENT OF INSANE USE OF INSULIN DIABETIC SERUM [ Per Press Association.] AUCKLAND, April 11. New hope for the insance by the use of insulin diabetic serum was described by a well-known San Francisco physician, Dr. John K. Plinez, M.D., when he arrived in Auckland on the German liner Reliance, in the course of 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 use of the serum was reported to have produced a startling improvement in the condition of patients in the provincial hospital. Experiments were conducted with 20 patients, of whom eight were cured and 80 per cent, of the remainder 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, the method which was first enunciated by Professor Jauregg, of Vienna, about 15 years ago,” Dr. Plinez stated. “The treatment can be used in all cases and the aim is to produce a condition of insulin shock and reduce 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 patients, 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 the institutions and had been able to resume their normay 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.