Article ID: CBB000932790

Strengthening the Will: Public Clinics for the Nervously Ill in Sweden in the First Half of the Twentieth Century (2009)

unapi

This article examines the development of state-run clinics for the nervously ill in Sweden in the interwar years. After the establishment of the Royal Board of Pensions in 1914, an institution for the care of the chronically neurotic was high on the agenda of this governmental agency. The Swedish state became actively involved in the fight against nervous illnesses, and the primary goal of these state-financed clinics was to turn neurotic patients into productive citizens. Neurotics were seen as a large group of potential invalids who might become a heavy burden on the national economy. They needed to be provided with effective therapy that would strengthen their will and restore their capacity so that they could be swiftly returned to normal life. It was this principle that characterised the clinical work at these institutions. The further development of the care of neuroses was the subject of a long and arduous debate that took place at the Swedish Society of Medicine in 1937. Neurosis was regarded as a national malady (folksjukdom) mainly because medical professionals---neurologists, psychiatrists, psychoanalysts, psychotherapists and internists---formulated it in terms of an extremely contagious diagnosis which, by the 1950s, seemed to affect everyone.

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Authors & Contributors
Melling, Joseph
Dondici, Danilo
Faschi, Viviana
Thabane, Motlatsi
Guelfi, Gian Paolo
Colucci, Mario
Concepts
Psychiatry
Psychiatric hospitals
Mental disorders and diseases
Clinical psychology
Public health
Medicine and society
Time Periods
20th century, early
20th century
19th century
21st century
20th century, late
18th century
Places
Italy
United States
England
Great Britain
United Kingdom
Lesotho
Institutions
United States. Food and Drug Administration (USFDA)
National Health Service (Great Britain)
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