The Zürich School of Psychiatry in theory and practice. Sabina Spielrein's treatment at the Burghölzli Clinic in Zürich.
The remarkably caring and privileged treatment of Sabina Spielrein at the Burghölzli Hospital 1904/05 (as shown by the records) exemplifies the standards and key concepts of the Zürich School of Psychiatry, founded by Auguste Forel and represented by the then current director Eugen Bleuler, as well as the specific dynamics between Bleuler, his first assistant C. G. Jung, and Spielrein herself. Bleuler, in accordance with the trauma theory of hysteria, steadfastly promoted the separation from her traumatizing family and supported her scientific education. Jung, deeply and emotionally involved, revealed how she had been traumatized, but in focusing on her masochistic feelings rather than on the victimization, he established a rather conflicted personal relationship with her, foreshadowing his later ambivalent attitude to Freud's sexual theory. Thus Sabina was discharged with a reasonable psychiatric and scientific education but an unreasonable need for personal dependency.
Graf-Nold
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Zürich University, Switzerland. a.graf-nold@swissonline.ch
D005260:Female; D049673:History, 20th Century; D006778:Hospitals, Psychiatric / Q000266:history*; D006801:Humans; D007046:Hysteria / Q000266:history*; D011572:Psychoanalysis / Q000266:history*; D013557:Switzerland