Mental Disease and Defect 



41 



developed a fear neurosis. However, under medical care and 

 social supervision he improved, returned to his work which he 

 had abandoned, and resumed the support of his family. No recur- 

 rence has yet been reported. 



Jake W., a Russian Jew, twenty-two years old, claims to have 

 been well all his life until he received news of his father's death 

 in Russia. He then had an ''attack" of hysteria, followed by 

 a persistent death fear. He was unable to work, very morbid, and 

 unhappy. Fortunately for him, his wife became ill at this time, 

 making it obligatory for him to return to work, and his improve- 

 ment began immediately. 



Miscellaneous mental and nervous disorders include chorea, 

 thyroid disturbances, drug addiction, and the many forms of 

 nervousness not insanity which make for an unbalanced men- 

 tality, stammering, deafness, paralysis, etc. Disorders due to 

 injury, affecting the nervous system, are also included in this 

 group. In some instances, the symptoms may be only the initial 

 stages of true insanity, as yet undiagnosed. From the social 

 viewpoint the important thing is that these patients are mentally 

 abnormal, whether it be temporarily or permanently. They need 

 first of all a complete diagnosis, then treatment in accordance 

 with it. Here will be found many of the "preventable" forms often 

 unrecognized by the layman as mental sickness. Each of these 

 disorders will be discussed later in connection with patients 

 studied. 



Florence R. is a little girl nine years old who is unable to 

 attend school because of chorea. She has had repeated attacks 

 of tonsilitis, followed by rheumatism previous to the chorea. 

 Her tonsils have been removed, but her nervous condition has not 

 yet subsided. The doctor has advised rest in bed and her mother 

 has tried to follow the treatment, but there are many stormy and 

 tearful protests from Florence, with the result that she does 

 not remain in bed long. She is bright, loves to read, and is 

 anxious to return to school, but is irritable and cross and in a 

 pitiful physical and mental condition. 



Alice C, age thirty-five, is addicted to the use of alcohol and 

 morphine. Her mother was said to have been mentally unbal- 

 anced. Alice is married, her husband now serving sentence in 

 the penitentiary for petit larceny. She was at one time sent to 

 the Woman's Prison for being one of a party in a drunken row. 



Mary V. has an excessive fear of everyone. She ran away 

 from home at one time because of this fear. It is rumored that 



