Shell Shock Research Paper

World War I marked the true end of the Victorian times and replaced its imperialism, peace, and female hysteria with gas warfare, mass bloodshed, and shell shock. Dr. Charles S. Myers, a British psychologist, was the first to write a paper on shell shock in 1915. By writing and publishing this paper Myers brought shell shock into the spotlight of war psychiatry diagnosis. Shell shock, also known as war neurosis, was by no means a new illness, the first signs of shell shock popped up during the Crimean War in 1845 with Crimean fever. One captain with Crimean fever reported “pains in all the limbs, clammy sweats, parched tongue, irritable heart, dizziness, headache and diarrhea, while being utterly unnerved and agitated violently by the merest

The treatments performed by male physicians on male soldiers throughout the world were hypnosis, suggestion, autosuggestion, distraction, terrorism, infliction of pain, persuasion, will training, occupational therapy, isolation, and psychoanalysis. Some of the treatments that were more prevalent in Britain were faradism, County House Scheme, hypnosis, hydrotherapy, psycho-analysis, and psycho-therapy.Faradism was another treatment that was first adopted by Dr. Lewis Yealland in 1918 and entailed “the application of an electrical current to various parts of the body, to cure functional aphnonians and paralysis.” One case that used this treatment was that of a 36-year-old volunteer that was paralyzed from the right knee down and a painful right hip. The treatment transcribed was “strong faradism was applied to his right leg for about an hour, feeling returned quickly and power came back to a considerable extent.” County House Scheme was first introduced by August 1917 by the Ministry of Pension, thus illustrating the growing public involvement in the treatment of shell shocked soldiers. This treatment sent shell shocked men “to volunteer in private households in rural areas for up to three months.” The agricultural labor and fresh country air helped clear the minds of the soldiers. Although there were reservations due some cases exhibiting symptoms of paralysis or deafness that could not be cured by the fresh air. There were four types of hypnosis: verbal suggestion, fixation, fascination, and various. The most prevalent was verbal suggestion with Captain J. A. Hadfield, a British psychologist, who practiced ‘collective hypnosis.’ Collective hypnosis was when a group of 20-25 men were hypnotized together and were “given ‘suitable general suggestions of confidence and reassurance’” which sometimes resulted in patients with