Hydrotherapy

I need that tub...think I could sneak out with it?

The horror which may (and probably did) echo from that room is definitely not something to take lightly.

I love how the bathtub appears to be almost glowing, what great lighting

thats soo awsome

The water too hot the skin quickens to blush
The inpatient orderly becomes equally flush
A flailing patient attempts to prevail
The orderly will later remove skin from his nails

Triniphen....
Wow! I guess a picture does speak a thousand words...

been there. seen it done in other "hospitals".

The tub was designed to be placed against a wall. The tile was put there to cover the exposed "wall side" of the tub. I guess it was easier to get patients in and out with access to both sides.

HydroTherapy was in no way warm water. It was ice cold designed to shock the paitents, for what purpose I do not know, I'm just a mechanic. But I do know for a fact it was not plesant.

in some situations, hydrotherapy was a so called 'therapy' for psych patients, but also it was used for patients in nursing homes and hospitals who had contracted limbs, to try to relax to muscles, so they could try to straighten them out a bit, the water was very warm, sort of like a hot tub.

Tom,

I know for a fact that your information is incorrect. :-)

"Another popular "spa treatment" to calm agitation was hydrotherapy, which was more than a nice warm bath. For instance, one practice was to wrap an agitated patient in cold (50 degree), wet sheets. A very disturbed patient could be placed in a continuous bath 18 hours a day for 2-3 weeks"”or whatever it took to change the aberrant behavior. The dangers of hydrotherapy were hypothermia, convulsions, and even drowning. "

Stripling, M. "BIOETHICS AND MEDICAL ISSUES IN LITERATURE." Westport Ct.: Greenwood Press, 2005

http://www.medicalhumanities.net/chapter.html

This almost looks like it belongs in an old fashioned dolls house.

lol...this is real freeky i couldnt imagine what happened or how they did this to people..insane or not it was worng!!! lol

RefLib,

"Cold pack" is not the same as "continuous water hydrotherapy" in a tub. Cold pack consisted of very cold, wet sheets wrapped around a person which they were kept in for hours at a time; usually either until they warmed the sheets up or until they quieted down. The theory behind the technique was to cool the person off because they were thought to be overly agitated, and the coldness of the sheets was to "counteract" the believed hotness of the blood, which supposedly caused the agitation.

The tubs were not cold; the sheets were cold. Both "therapies" had the same name, so people get confused and think the tubs were cold. If anyone ever used an ice cold tub full of water to immerse a patient they were not doing it to be therapeutic. If you are at all familiar with how much temperature variation a body can stand, you will quickly figure out that to put someone in a tub full of very cold water for any longer than a short period of time is fatal. If you killed off too many of your patients, even back in the "dark ages" of 50 years ago, you would quickly be investigated.

Regardless, the idea was not to torture people; there was a true belief that this technique helped people. The stats weren't that bad when there were NO other interventions that worked. And yes, you had nuts and sadists and torturers back then, just like you do now, who, when they were underfunded and stressed out, did pretty nasty things to people. Sort of like what that jerk who lives down the street from us does to his or her child and yet most of us still won't "get involved" for fear of a lawsuit or a violent confrontation.

In hindsight it is easy to be critical of what happened 50 to 75 years ago when there were no ways of treating people other than locking them up. The way we got to the few treatments we have today was by trying out new ideas and keeping the ones that worked. That is called science. Cures and interventions don't spontaneously generate. Hypotheses are formulated, techniques are tried, and if they don't work, you go back to the drawing board. I can't be horribly critical of people for what they didn't know at the time, but at least they were trying something.

Please, don't be embarassed Lynne. I am finally learning things about the human brain that has fascinated me for many years.
What's better is that I am learning to appreciate all the work that goes into Mental Health Care.
I know that it is a field that is sorely in need of the right kinds of people to go into this section of medical care.
I have also learned more about the old ways of treating illnesses, and that it isn't the 1800's where you can be a lobotomy candidate for masturbating.
You do Motts, this site, and us a great service by being here and working to advocate proper treatment and care of the patients. I am proud to read your comments and rally behind you as you remember to {thump} us all on the head with the knowledge you posess.

Thank you very much for all you do, both here and on your job.

THANK YOU!!! You have a picture of a Hydrotherapy tub. This is going in the archives for good.

this picture rocks OUT LOUD

Its so shiny clean. WOW!! Nice pic!!

Hydro "therapy" like insulin shock "therapy" was cruel...end of story. And modern day ECT kills brain cells, destroying peoples memory in the process. http://www.breggin.com

[Thump thump thump]

Just pick a more credible source, please, instead of the black-&-white folks who get paid large consultation fees to say this.

Aw crap, you got her started again! Lynne dear, here's your cumezykyana thingy, now quit hurting your head. We need those brain cells intact! :D Soon you can have a wiki waki woo too!

ok that whole hydrotherapy gives me the creeps, those poor ppl!

its to bad they dont use those anymore for some of the many sick bastards that are still roaming around

Yes, you are correct. Sick bastards who roam around also need to take baths as well as everyone else. I'm not quite sure how giving someone a nice bath is going to cure them, however, other than to improve their hygiene a bit.

yeeps...this place is so creepy im half expecting that thing to start overflowing with blood...
These are some nice pictures. You have an amazing eye for photography, as well as nerves of steel. You couldnt pay me to go in there alone!

Lynne, your grasp of history of the system just contstantly amazes me. I observed the photo and said to myself, self, what a great tub. It has nice tile on one side, It's deep, no price was spared to buy this tub, but what does it end up to be for most of readers, a source of torture and abuse. We damned lucky that we have you for straight on reality. The kids need a constant reality check, times have become so grotesque that it has been blurred and our kids have missed it.

i know what the reality is, but try telling that to my subconcious. i admire this piece for its aestetic value, and i am aware of what these devices were used for. though it may seem like torture today, its treatments like hydrotherapy that led modern psychology and science to pursue the truth about how the body and the mind works and how to better treat it.
im a lot more historically sensitive to these sort of things than i may come off as at first. i was just expressing my personal thoughts that this particular image generated in me, and it did weird me out slightly.
i browse this place to learn about the historic value of these sites, not fantasize about knife wielding maniacs and insane freaks

Not a hydro therapy tub. Hydro therapy tubs had spots to anchor a canvas top to the tub so the Hydrotherapy patient could be kept in the tub. And so the staff doing it would not be innundated by water.. All the floors had bathtubs. . Regular bath tubs. That I believe is one of them. Hydro was carried out on a specific floor in the hospital,which one escapes me, one of the destroyed buildings I think. Helluva picture though

All of the hydro tubs were destroyed in either the 70s or the 80s

imagine how many people have been in that thing.....lol

Wow, at first I thought this seemed like the most innocent looking picture out of the whole lot. Thanks Lynne for setting me straight, LoL. What a great shot.

Definitely torture. Jo or surly girl will chime in here at some point, or Dr. Sketch or Tony or someone, and we will all agree - DEFINITELY torture. ;-)

Torture is right. You ever try taking a 289 pound soapy person who doen't want to get out of the tub, out of a tub? Talk about back breaking labor and torture..

Makes me glad we have showers and no bathtubs, Ed.

torture! all of it!

seriously tho, i've just read "Mad in America" and it's extremely thought-provoking. the thing that comes across throughout (and yes, some of the treatments seem startling in today's context) is that every treatment was designed IN AN EFFORT TO HELP PATIENTS. misguided or not, there it is. and a lot of it was - i don't think anyone would try to deny it. the road to hell and all that...

Hydrotherapy isn't as cruel as people think. Spas, whirlpools, and hot tubs all have their roots in hydrotherapy.

This is the Cadillac of tubs! I realize that this was in a hospital setting but I can't help but imagine soaking in something like that with a good book and soft music playing.

I would have been freaked taking this pic, worrying that someone was gonna rise from the tub.

this gallery was not so great.

The first lobotomy wasn't performed until the 1930's........not in the 1800's.

There were many forms of hydrotherapy.The different methods were used to stimulate or sedate a patient,relieve pain and insomnia,stimulate perspiration to eliminate toxins.Varied water temperature produced different effects on the patient.

Doesnt look like a hydro tub to me. Just looks like a normal tub and shower. Hydro tubs of that era usually had like a headboard attached with various gauges and dials, and a fixation point for canvas sheeting over the top.

that tub help sooth the patiants when they were upset or if they had pain

Right. This is a regular bathtub. In the late 60's there was a hydrotherapy room at Danvers with canvas covers on the tubs that were used to contain the patients in an ice bath or hot water. However, to my knowledge, no hydrotherapy was used when I worked there. 1968-71
I loved picking the brains of old time employees who were working there at the time.

It's incredible... I'm trying to imagine how the very last day of ordinary activity seemed... And what happened next? They just turned off lights, locked everything and went together away?? Or was there the last working unit, performing as usual in more and more empty complex?

What was Hydrotherapy

What was hydrotherapy?

My 80 year old cousin was in Fernald as a child, and He was experimented on by Quaker oats and MIT... It was not Breakfast. they fed him... Look it up...Lynn do you have family or personal experience with he tub? Let me say this, That tub was built for treatment perhaps that is true, but more than often it was used for punishment and experiments... I have read his file/charts it was no bubble bath Lynn.... Lot of facts have been covered up just like the Salem witch trails we "Americans" are ashamed and hide the horrors we have done as much as possible. So we can " appear humane" When you have unpleasent opportunity to read the sad history of a relative who was in a few Asylums ( wrongfully diagnossed) you read more than you want to know... Furthermore Lack of funds is no excuse to torture the ill or let me use the correct terminology of that day lunatics morons, insane or imbeciles, today that would translate the Depressed, post partum women, dyslexic kids, learning disabled , senial elders or epileptics, but for historical argument sake lets just call them all feeble minded since that's ok to right? NOT!!!!
know your history I'm sure the syringes megale used were not created for injecting toxic chemicals into the eyes of twins .... but that is what he did with them. My point is not all that is created for good will be used that way.... History speaks for itself and I agree with the post above " a picture is worth a thousand words" There is nothing theraputic looking about this tub against a wall....

Hi, Advocate,

Peace, my friend. :-)

since i know so much. what is hydrotherapy? and thats a hott tub not a hotub. easliy mistaken

When I worked with facilities that were closing, the closure took a number of years, with intermediate targets to be met on the way to final closure. The institution's population was gradually reduced, first by ceasing new admissions of children (under age 18), then by ending all new admissions, then by setting up community placements for the current residents. The residents with the fewest and least complicated needs would be placed first. Population also declined due to patient deaths--many of the patients had very complex physical needs in addition to their mental health/developmental needs. As people moved to their new community homes, the remaining units would be consolidated, with more and more of the campus being closed, until finally the very last patients moved to the community (in some cases it is part of a closure plan to move some patients from the institution closing to another state institution that is still open). There were court orders involved, so there was regular oversight by a court monitor as well as by various state agencies and the legislature. The last, and most difficult-to-place group, became part of a special legal "class" that provided additional funding due to the cost of their care in the community. At the very end, it really was a case of "Will the last person here please turn out the lights."

Has anyone read the book Project 17? It's really good. It's about six kids who made a video of themselves exploring Danver State Hospital. It got me obsessed with insane asylums. They're just so interesting.

That book was awesome and did the hospital some justice. Those poor ppl.

actually eilenajean, the first lobotomies were performed way way back in the roman times. youd have to do your research to know. lobotomies didnt become well know until the 1930s

does anyone know the author/s publishers of that book, project 17? Thanks

Laurie Faria Stolarz

I read the book 'Project 17' by laurie stolarz its really good its about Danver State Hospital.

i think Project 17 is what got me obsessed with asylums as well... It still is my favourite book EVER!