Early history of local mental health treatment
Red Deer ExpressMar 01, 2018
On
This was both a celebration and an educational session on one of the nation's oldest and largest voluntary organizations, which has done outstanding work on one of the leading health issues for Canadians.
Mental health has been a concern as long as humankind has existed.
Although the problems were not well understood, mental health was a particular concern during the early settlement of western
People faced incredible adversities while trying to create a new life on the frontier.
Sometimes, the ongoing challenges and frequent disasters were more than the pioneers' minds could manage. Moreover, loneliness and isolation were a huge problem.
People were removed from the usual supports of family, friends and community.
In the very early years, those who were deemed to be insane were transported to the Manitoba Asylum in
In 1907, after the Province of
A site was then acquired at
The project was a significant one.
However, it was not until
Mental health became a major crisis during the horrific First World War (1914-1918).
Men on the front lines were pitted against new technologically-advanced weapons. The result was catastrophic losses of life and incredible wounds to both the body and mind. The latter cases were referred to as 'shell shock'.
Today we would refer to those wounds as P.T.S.D.
The wartime P.T.S.D. crisis provided a huge boost to the work of Dr.
People were becoming increasingly aware of the inadequacy of programs and facilities for the treatment of mental health cases. Beers' book, The Mind That Found Itself, based on his own experiences in the American asylum system, was key in helping to identify and publicize those problems.
Now the nation was faced with thousands of veterans returning home with serious mental health problems, with very little in the way of programs and facilities to deal with them.
Consequently, in 1918,
It is an indication of the heightened public awareness of mental health issues that 18 prominent figures in Canadian medicine and business agreed to join the C.N.C.M.H.'s first board of directors.
Among those who volunteered were the president of the CPR, the head of the
A lot of support for the new C.N.C.M.H. was garnered by holding innovative 'drawing room meetings' at the homes of influential citizens.
Meanwhile, in 1916, the Alberta Government purchased the
However, with the escalating numbers of shell-shocked veterans, a decision was made to turn the facility into a special mental health hospital for veterans.
The Red Deer Soldiers' Sanitorium officially opened in
Many of the first patients were transferees from the overcrowded
In 1923, the Provincial Government built the
The
(To be continued)