The subjects herewith presented, while including certain of the most
important sections of mental disease, make no claim to completeness
either in the subject matter presented or in the attempt to cover the
entire field of the psychoses. They cover those portions, however, with
which we have come in closest touch at the Still-Hildreth Sanatorium,
and in which we have the most complete records. I have been aided in
the compilation of the essential facts and statistics by the able staff
of the institution and wish to acknowledge especially the valuable
cooperation of Dr. C. M. VanDuzer in the Dementia Praecox group, Dr. H.
P. Hoyle in the Manic Depressive group, Dr. B. L. Jemmette in the group
entitled Delirium, Confusion and Stupor, Dr. J. C. Snyder in the Senile
Dementia group and Dr. G. S. Elkins in the Involutional group. The
opinions concerning each type held by Dr. A. G. Hildreth are appended
under its appropriate heading. I wish to state emphatically that
the sole treatment carried out in the Macon Institution is specific
corrective work upon spinal lesions, and it is upon this treatment that
the statistics are based which are to be found throughout the text.
These records cover more than 700 cases, including complete histories
of the patients with the physical and mental findings on examination;
these represent, therefore, by far the largest body of statistics ever
accumulated in the study of osteopathic results in mental disorders.
While the results naturally vary in different types of mental disease
the grand total shows that more than one-half of all patients admitted
recovered. Details for each group will be mentioned under its
appropriate heading. While adjuncts such as diet and hydrotherapy have
been utilized; we certainly cannot attribute any curative value to
their influence.
It should be further emphasized that in no case whatsoever has medicine
been used as a curative agent. And the same may be said of surgery.
It has indeed been conclusively proved even in the medical world that
medicines and surgical procedures are absolutely ineffective; from
the osteopathic viewpoint this of course is perfectly reasonable
since the theory calls for definite lesions as causative factors and
these lesions can hardly be reached other than by the osteopathic
method of correction. The results obtained, therefore, could only
be attributed to the genuine osteopathic principle enunciated by Dr.
A. T. Still who kept in close touch with the work and gave it his
approval up to the time of his death. He had always maintained that
the osteopathic principle could accomplish remarkable results in this
field and considering the previous inefficiency of any other method his
confidence has been fully justified.