Fit for work, capable of being discharged, capable of being transferred

Abstract

Research on psychiatry under National Socialism has largely focused on the medical crimes of compulsory sterilisation and patient killings. The therapies carried out in everyday psychiatric work and the assessments of their success received significantly less attention. Even under the conditions of National Socialism, the assessments of therapeutic success led to dismissals or transfers within or between institutions as a part of the “normal” psychiatric practice. In the negative case, however, these assessments could also have fatal consequences for the patients. In this respect, it is relevant what psychiatrists understood by “healing” and “remission” during this period, how and in what gradations they assessed the success of their treatments - also with regard to the more recent, intensive somatic therapy measures and occupational therapy. The article explores these questions as a case study using the examples of the university psychiatrists Gottfried Ewald and Carl Schneider, who wrote both textbooks and are known for their different attitudes towards patient killings.