The fortieth annual report of the visitors of the County Lunatic Asylum, Stafford : for the year ending December 31, 1858.

  • Staffordshire County Lunatic Asylum.
Date:
[1859]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The fortieth annual report of the visitors of the County Lunatic Asylum, Stafford : for the year ending December 31, 1858. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    The tables of several preceding years shew -hat little difference occurs in the form of the lisorder of the patients admitted within the 12 (nontlis; but no definition of this protean malady :an be depended upon in all cases, as the expe¬ dience of all persons connected with Asylums ■hews how frequently acute Mania verges into mbecility or Melancholia, whilst the very op- Dosite changes just as frequently occur. Out of the number admitted in 1858, 42 patients are stated in the medical certificates to ;iLave shewn a strong suicidal propensity; and •everal of these were only brought after making ; ery determined attempts upon their own lives. Dut of 5 cases of wounds inflicted upon the ihroat previous to admission, 3 died shortly after leing received in the Asylum,—two of these oc- [urring in old men verging upon 80, and the r.hird of such an extensive character as to forbid 11 hope of recovery. The suicidal or homicidal desire frequently reaves patients after their admission, as soon as ny improvement of the general health takes lace, but that such is not always the result, the !ase of attempted suicide alluded to in the Re- lort of the Visiting Justices shews: in this instance, a female 38 years of age, of melancholic smperament, having obtained possession of a nail pair of scissors, removed three inches of the nail intestines:—an artificial anus having been ormed just below the navel, the health of the atient has been re-established, with however a otal obliteration of from 12 to 14 feet of the Forms of Disorder. Suicidal Cases.