After his 17-year-old son suddenly developed a chronic psychotic illness in 1905,
Bayard Taylor Holmes (1852–1924), a Chicago physician and surgeon with no
psychiatric training, conducted both library and laboratory research on dementia
praecox, as described in Part 1 of this two-part study. By late 1915 he believed he
had found support for a focal infection theory of its aetiology – an
ergot-like toxaemia caused by faecal stasis in the caecum. Holmes was also the
editor of what is believed to be the first medical journal named after a psychiatric
disorder: Dementia Praecox Studies. Part 2 will describe Holmes’ adoption
of a rational therapy (using it first on his son, who died), and his founding of a
Psychiatric Research Laboratory.
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Antisepsis in abdominal operations. Synopsis of a series of bacteriological studies
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(1937)
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Is it desirable and practicable in medical schools to teach methods of
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The clinical ‘late chloroform poisoning’ and adolescent insanity
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(1908b)
Symptomatic toxaemia from local infections
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The Abderhalden reaction applied to diagnosis in psychiatry
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A plea for research into the possibility of the cure of dementia praecox by
the use of serum containing the defensive ferment
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The use of sodium nucleate in dementia praecox, including a review of the
subject from a clinical standpoint and an extensive bibliography
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500–516
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19.
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(1915c)
Adrenalin: a new diagnostic test for dementia praecox
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449–460
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(1915d)
The relations between dementia praecox and certain toxic amines
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514–517
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(1916a)
Public education in regard to dementia praecox
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Some recent researches in dementia praecox
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Alienists and Neurologists
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Prospectus of Dementia Praecox Studies
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The apology to the reader
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A guide to the documents in evidence of the toxaemia of dementia praecox
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23–107
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Dementia praecox, the insanity of the young
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105–137
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(1922a)
Some reflections on the social significance of dementia praecox apropos Dr.
Furbush's statistics
. Dementia Praecox Studies,5,
120–127
.
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(1916a)
Clinical dementia praecox without known disturbed periods, scant adrenalin
mydriasis, and diminished pressor adrenalin reaction. Typical defensive
ferment reactions, cecal stasis, large load of betaiminazolylethylamine in
the stool
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12–19
.
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The relation of cecal stasis to dementia praecox
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The proximal colon and its relation to the production of toxic amines
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Sensation, Irrtum, Betrug? – Emil Abderhalden und die Geschichte
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