Abstract
Casimir Liber Rozelle Hospital, Sydney, Australia:
I was unhappy to read Assen Jablensky [1] consider that psychiatry is alone or unusual in still using concepts from last century in formulation of current cases. I would like to remind him that Rudolph Virchow (1821–1902) of Virchow's Triad fame, and Thomas Bayes (born 1701; Bayes' Theorem) are two authorities whose algorithms are still very much in use by a wide array of medical specialities, not just thought of in historical context. Likewise, aspirin recently celebrated its 100th anniversary of discovery, which predates much of Freud's work.
I also took exception to his statement about the theoretical framework having changed ‘surprisingly little’ since the turn of the century, with new concepts ‘from genetics to epidemiology’ (and presumably excluding developmental psychiatry itself). The concept of posttraumatic stress disorder, attachment theory, and the works of Klein, Anna Freud, Bowlby, Winnicott, Ainsworth's work in Uganda all took place over the years of the 20th century and are intrinsic to various psychiatrists' understanding of their field.