Amentia and dementia : a clinico-pathological study / by Joseph Shaw Bolton.

  • Bolton, Joseph Shaw, 1867-1946.
Date:
1905
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Amentia and dementia : a clinico-pathological study / by Joseph Shaw Bolton. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    Case 106.—C. P—, female, single, dressmaker, cet. 22. Certified 3 years. A lively-looking girl of Jewish appearance who wants to see what I am writing and is never still a moment. She asks me why I don’t “ take that dirty rag off my finger and put a clean one on ” (my finger is bandaged). She gives her name but when asked her age says “ten ” and laughs. Then she tries to pull my beard and laughs and makes remarks about my teeth. She gets hold of my watch and chain and wants to see the former. She remarks, “Ain’t you got funny green eyes ! ” She notices the buttons on my sleeve and then remarks, “ I don’t want to stay in this shop.” She takes my pencil and pretends to write but makes a scrawl and then throws the pencil down and laughs, and then asks me to give her it again so that she can “draw another little picture.” She is most monkey-like and inquisitive and altogether like a silly, forward, spoiled child. She can be made to work at times by careful management. She can sew nicely, and can put on patches. She would be a very intelligent worker if she were rather more steady. If not looked after she pulls stockings, blanket bindings, etc., to pieces, and ties the wool round her hair to decorate herself, and makes bracelets, rings, etc., of it. She is fond of using a looking-glass, and will get on a chair to do so. She is very clean and can make her bed. She dresses herself but not tidily. She is very mischievous, but is quite harmless, and if managed tactfully is obedient and tractable. Group II.—Class (b). Cases of Simple Emotional Chronic Mania. This class contains 36 cases, of whom 4 are males and 32 are females. The chief characteristic of these cases is a lack of higher control, in the younger types over the emotions and in the older over the intellectual processes. In many cases the abnormal mental state is one of simple instability. The patients are like silly, lively, unstable, and petted children, with an exuberance of spirits and a liability to act on impulse and to do outre things. They are passionate and wilful and at times are difficult to manage, but they are often pets and favourites. Intellectually they may be incon- sequent in conversation almost to the stage of complete inco- herence, and during attacks of excitement they present such a marked degree of hyperaesthesia of the special senses that they are credited with hallucinations, and at times probably suffer from these. The more marked cases have an almost entire loss of control over their emotions and instincts, and are troublesome,