Development of Psychiatry in Latvia between 1918 and 1940. Summary of the Doctoral Thesis

Abstract

Thesis “Development of psychiatry in Latvia between 1918 and 1940” deals with several aspects of the history of psychiatry and describes it as an essential component of the country’s health care system, as a scholary discipline, as a clinical practice, also assessing the role of psychiatry in social processes. Basically paper describes expansion of institutionalized psychiatry in Latvia, with following severe overloading of hospitals and poor access to mental health care. This was mostly down to poorly organized social care for psychiatric patients. The efforts of deinstitutionalization are characterized as well. Paper deals with establishment of Department of Psychiatry in University of Latvia and its future development into somatically focused school of psychiatry. The clinical practice is described with main focus on introduction of so-called somatic therapy methods in psychiatry. This changed psychiatry in a fundamental manner in Latvia, concluding the process of medicalization of psychiatry that began in the 19th century. In the interwar period the flourishing interest about heredity of psychiatric illnesses led some psychiatrists to involve themselves in public health programs and eugenic movement. Thesis describes psychiatrists role in eugenic theory and practice in Latvia, and its influence on mentally ill people after the sterilization law was passed.