WeRead Powered by ReaderPub
Shell shock and its lessons cover

Shell shock and its lessons

Chapter 2: Preface.
Open in WeRead

About This Book

The authors compile clinical observations and allied reports to define the variety of war-related nervous disorders grouped under shell-shock, emphasizing the multiplicity of symptoms and individual differences in presentation. They survey causal factors, practical treatments used in military hospitals, and psychological methods for analysis and re-education aimed at restoring function. Case-based discussion supports recommendations for prompt, sympathetic intervention and outlines organizational measures for care. The final chapters extract broader lessons about public attitudes, the need for scientific psychiatry, and applying humane wartime practices to civilian mental-health services after the conflict.

Preface.

Our reasons for writing this book will be explained by the book itself. We desire here gratefully to acknowledge the help of several friends who have considerably facilitated our task. Our thanks are due to Major R. G. Rows, M.D., R.A.M.C., for his unfailing interest, encouragement and help; to Captains W. H. R. Rivers, M.D., F.R.C.P., F.R.S., and J. W. Astley Cooper of the R.A.M.C., and Mr. E. Gleaves, M.Sc., for their valuable suggestions and assistance in the preparation of the manuscript; to Captain W. E. Sawers Scott, M.D., R.A.M.C., Dr. Albert Hopkinson and Mr. W. Percy Stocks, F.R.C.S., of Manchester, for help in other ways; and to our colleague, Professor H. Bompas Smith, for reading the proofs and helping us to eliminate some of the more glaring literary defects. To the Editor of the Lancet we are indebted for permission to use part of an article written by one of us. The stream of requests for fuller information and explanation that poured in upon the author of that article made the writing of this book an unavoidable duty.

G. E. S.
T. H. P.

The Medical School,
The University,
Manchester.


20th April, 1917.