Abstract
This paper examines the evidence behind the use and decline of insulin coma therapy as a treatment for schizophrenia and how this was viewed by the psychiatric profession. The paper demonstrates that, from the time of its introduction, there was considerable debate regarding the evidence for insulin treatment, and scepticism about its purported benefits. The randomized trials conducted in the 1950s were the result, rather than the origins, of this debate. Although insulin treatment was subsequently abandoned, it was still regarded as a historic moment in the modernization of psychiatry. Then, as now, evidence does not speak for itself, and insulin continued to be incorporated into the story of psychiatric progress even after it was shown to be ineffective.
Highlights
Insulin coma therapy, a widely used treatment for people diagnosed with schizophrenia from the 1930s to the 1960s, is usually regarded as a useless and dangerous procedure sustained by indiscriminate medical enthusiasm, an example of ‘furor therapeuticus’ (Eisenberg, 2007; Jones, 2000)
This paper examines the evidence behind the use and decline of insulin coma therapy as a treatment for schizophrenia and how this was viewed by the psychiatric profession
‘the prolonged use and advocacy of ineffective treatments is a commonplace of medical history and current practice’, as Jones (2000: 149) puts it, insulin coma therapy is one of the most notorious recent examples of this tendency
Summary
A widely used treatment for people diagnosed with schizophrenia from the 1930s to the 1960s, is usually regarded as a useless and dangerous procedure sustained by indiscriminate medical enthusiasm, an example of ‘furor therapeuticus’ (Eisenberg, 2007; Jones, 2000). Abstract This paper examines the evidence behind the use and decline of insulin coma therapy as a treatment for schizophrenia and how this was viewed by the psychiatric profession. Keywords History of psychiatry, insulin coma therapy, ‘The insulin myth’, insulin shock, treatment of schizophrenia
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