Difference between revisions of "Portal:Featured Article Of The Week"

From Asylum Projects
Jump to: navigation, search
 
(585 intermediate revisions by the same user not shown)
Line 1: Line 1:
 
{{FAformat
 
{{FAformat
|Title= Fulton State Hospital
+
|Title= Kalamazoo State Hospital
|Image= Fulton1.jpg
+
|Image= 10-18-2007-09a.jpg
 
|Width= 150px
 
|Width= 150px
|Body= In 1847, the Missouri General Assembly enacted legislation to establish an asylum for the insane in the central area of the state. This institution was to provide physical care for societal "lunatics." Several counties were encouraged to bid for this institution. Callaway County was able to produce $11,500 and 500 acres of land, thus winning the bid. Fulton State Hospital, the first public mental institution west of the Mississippi River in 1851, admitted its first 67 patients in December.
+
|Body= The choice of Kalamazoo as the location for the Michigan Asylum at Kalamazoo was helped by the fact that the governor was Epaphroditus Ransom, who once resided in Kalamazoo. Although the asylum was originally planned for a site in what is now the Stuart neighborhood, it was decided that this location was too close to downtown. So planners instead chose to place the hospital far out in the country, where they would never be bothered by these people. That location was on what is now Oakland Drive, where the hospital is still located.
  
The original building was three stories high, excluding the basement and attic. It contained 72 rooms and housed the same number of patients. The center of the building was reserved for a patient dining area, and lodging rooms for officers, attendants, and laborers. All employees of the hospital were required to live on the grounds, and had to obtain special permission from the Superintendent in order to leave. The hospital was almost totally self-sufficient at this time. By maintaining sewing rooms, vegetable and straw houses, raising their own food, pumping water from underground wells and streams, and making their own soap, the hospital was similar to a small city, requiring few resources from outside its grounds.
+
The asylum was on the cutting edge of many forms of treatment. Through its close proximity to town, it was able to establish an innovative outpatient clinic in 1916 as well as a unique "family-care" program that placed patients in certified homes. The hospital also made use of colony farms, adjunct properties on which patients with milder illnesses — and those who today might be considered developmentally delayed — lived in familial farm settings. (One of these was near Kalamazoo's Asylum Lake.) They often raised livestock and produce for use at the hospital. The farms are examples of the limited treatment options for the mentally ill that were available before the 1950s. Electroshock therapy, insulin-induced comas and some barbiturate drugs resulted in limited reversals in thoughts and behavior of patients, he said.  [[Kalamazoo State Hospital|Click here for more...]]
 
 
According to State Biennial Reports, several probable causes of mental illness were determined in the first cases admitted. Among the more unusual causes were indigestion, religious anxiety, disappointed love, intense study, and jealousy. Epilepsy and tuberculosis were the two most common causes. As psychiatry was virtually an unexplored field, primary emphasis was placed on the physical needs of the individuals and maintaining a system of order within the hospital.  [[Fulton State Hospital|Click here for more...]]
 
 
}}
 
}}

Latest revision as of 04:27, 22 September 2024

Featured Article Of The Week

Kalamazoo State Hospital


10-18-2007-09a.jpg

The choice of Kalamazoo as the location for the Michigan Asylum at Kalamazoo was helped by the fact that the governor was Epaphroditus Ransom, who once resided in Kalamazoo. Although the asylum was originally planned for a site in what is now the Stuart neighborhood, it was decided that this location was too close to downtown. So planners instead chose to place the hospital far out in the country, where they would never be bothered by these people. That location was on what is now Oakland Drive, where the hospital is still located.

The asylum was on the cutting edge of many forms of treatment. Through its close proximity to town, it was able to establish an innovative outpatient clinic in 1916 as well as a unique "family-care" program that placed patients in certified homes. The hospital also made use of colony farms, adjunct properties on which patients with milder illnesses — and those who today might be considered developmentally delayed — lived in familial farm settings. (One of these was near Kalamazoo's Asylum Lake.) They often raised livestock and produce for use at the hospital. The farms are examples of the limited treatment options for the mentally ill that were available before the 1950s. Electroshock therapy, insulin-induced comas and some barbiturate drugs resulted in limited reversals in thoughts and behavior of patients, he said. Click here for more...