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Shell-shock and other neuropsychiatric problems

Chapter 89: Case 78. (Hurst, March, 1917.)
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About This Book

The work assembles nearly six hundred clinical case histories drawn from wartime medical literature to document combat-related neuropsychiatric disorders. It presents concise case protocols illustrating varied symptom patterns, diagnostic dilemmas, malingering and simulation, therapeutic interventions, and treatment outcomes, and includes bibliographic references and introductory commentary. Sections juxtapose cases to illuminate contested diagnoses and to inform postwar rehabilitation and mental-hygiene efforts, aiming to provide clinicians and reconstruction workers with detailed clinical material for recognizing, classifying, and managing neuropsychiatric consequences of war.

Sham fits.

Case 78. (Hurst, March, 1917.)

An unwilling conscript developed numerous fits on board ship coming from Jersey, three days after enlisting. Fifty more developed during two days in hospital. He was sent to Netley.

On the hypothesis of hysteria or malingering, he was hypnotized. A fit was suggested to him, but did not come off. The Sister was informed in the patient’s hearing that the man was clearly shamming, as in all genuine cases a fit would occur after this treatment. A fit with marked opisthotonos immediately occurred. This fit immediately stopped when he was ordered to stop it and to wake up.

The man after waking promised to have no more fits.