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o’s Nest” and what their
perception is of the procedure. Do they consider it barbaric, without any possible redeeming
value? If the answer to that question is “yes,” then you can play devil’s advocate by presenting
the following scenario.
Imagine that you are a doctor on staff in a mental hospital in the late 1940s. Your mental hospital,
constructed to hold 700 patients, now has over 1,300. Many of these are violent and need to be
tied to their beds or kept in locked cells. Antipsychotic drugs will not be invented for another five
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CHAPTER 16: THERAPIES FOR PERSONAL CHANGE
to ten years. Patients regularly attack one another, as well as the attendants. Other patients run
through the hallways, screaming and yelling. You have one patient who has been in the hospital
for 25 years and has essentially been kept in confinement. You hold no hope of recovery.
However, you know that there is a therapeutic technique that will take only a half-hour, and if
successful, will result in a significant decrease in episodes of violent behavior in this patient.
Again, if the procedure is successful, the patient will appear to be much happier and more
content with life. You also know that for most patients receiving this procedure there will be little
difference in measurable IQ. You know of no behavioral test that routinely shows any mental
deficit from the procedure. Would you, as this patient’s doctor, use this procedure?