Identifier: mentaldiseaseste00cole (find matches)
Title: Mental diseases. A text-book of psychiatry for medical students and practitioners
Year: 1913 (1910s)
Authors: Cole, Robert Henry, 1866-1926
Subjects:
Publisher: New York, Wood
Contributing Library: Columbia University Libraries
Digitizing Sponsor: Open Knowledge Commons

View Book Page: Book Viewer
About This Book: Catalog Entry
View All Images: All Images From Book
Click here to view book online to see this illustration in context in a browseable online version of this book.

Text Appearing Before Image:
h arms andlegs. In advanced cases the patients perceptive powers areparalysed, so that he does not recognize objects (imperception)and mistakes the identity of his relations. Short of this,confusion of ideas is marked, and there is retardation in theflow of ideas. Memory for existing events is quite disordered.The patient is in a bewildered state, owing to functional dis-sociation, and either does not appreciate the nature of questionsor gives wrong answers. Fleeting delusions occur. At timesthe patient may be elated, at other times depressed, but theemotional sphere, for the most part, is in a negative state. Thepatient is unable to judge of his surroundings, and shows noproper appreciation of time or place (disorientation). Hal-lucinations are always present and are characteristic of thedisorder, so that some authors have called it Hallucinatoryinsanity. Patients see visions or hear voices, andthe other senses are also commonly involved. He sees specks ACUTE CONFUSIONAL INSANITY 127
Text Appearing After Image:
Fig. 25.—Acute Confusional insanity. 128 MENTAL DISEASES in his food, which he says smells and tastes evil, so that fre-quently he refuses to eat voluntarily, and has to be forcibljfed. In a severe case the patient is wet and dirtjdn his habits,and gives wa) to masturbation. He moves about aimlessl)^,he is often resistive, and he becomes excited and incoherent.The patient remains in an acute state for some months, andthen gradually improves, sleeping better at night, and takingmore notice of his surroundings. To him his illness has seemedlike a terrifjdng dream, the details of which are blurred in hismemory. Occasionallj^ there is a relapse, and sometimes severalattacks occur during the lifetime of an individual, but this israre. Varieties.—According as to whether the disorder is accom-panied by depression or exaltation, authors have made adistinction into : (1) a Depressed form and (2) an Exaltedform. There is also (3) a Katatonic form, in which the patientis Stuporous or Mute an

Note About Images