Abstract
O'DOHERTY'S paper discusses various possible explanations for the unusually high level of mental hospitalization in the Republic of Eire. The two most probable explanations relate to emigration and culture. On the cultural side, three factors are mentioned: a marked and long-established tolerance for the psychotic, traditional abhorrence of suicide, and late marriage. After World War II there was a considerable influx of Southern Italian labourers into Switzerland. Many of these migrants developed mental disorders on account of which they had to be hospitalized. RISSO and BOKER in their monograph describe the characteristics of these patients. Outstanding among the symptoms displayed is the overpowering delusion of having been bewitched. Their delusional systems are based on beliefs commonly held in the original setting of these patients. Treatment of such patients presents difficult problems to Swiss psychiatrists. CROCETTI and his coworkers confirm the observation made by previous investigators that in some districts of Croatia the rate of schizo phrenic patients is unusually high. They also noted an unusually high rate of other mental disorders in the same districts (cf. Z. Susic, Transultural Psychiatric Rerearch, 2, 1957, 22).
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