Depressive States: Their Aetiology and Treatment

Depression is a large subject, and the purpose of this paper is to discuss merely a few aspects of it. Some years ago a front page to the out-patient notes of psychiatric patients attending Westminster Hospital was devised which was intended to give the essential facts of the case when the patient came up on subsequent occasions. It was envisaged, of course, that the data collected might be examined, for the hospital is fortunate in having a records officer and a Powers-Samas machine; but no particular piece of research was in mind at the time. These points are mentioned since it is relevant to notice that the original observations were made without any motive save of a very general kind, and the results; being computed by a machine, should be free from the unconscious distortion that can sometimes mar such retrospective studies. Data of this kind could be produced for any psychiatric syndrome, and a study of anxiety states on somewhat similar lines has already been published