Morningside Hospital: A Historical Case Study for the Diagnosis and Treatment of Depression in Mid-Century American Psychiatry
Gabriella Farland
Faculty Mentor(s): Kristin Yarris & Mary Wood
Oral Session 2 SW
Morningside Hospital was an inpatient psychiatric hospital in Portland, Oregon operating from the early 1900s through the 1960s. A significant portion of the hospital’s patient population were Native Alaskans, due to insufficient public mental health infrastructure in the then-territory. Morningside serves as a case study for examining the practices of American Psychiatry at the height of the institutionalization of those deemed mentally ill. This research uses archival materials from UO Special Collections, namely, the DeWitt Burkes papers (1955-1958) as primary source evidence to historically analyze how depression was diagnosed and treated at Morningside in the 1950s. I analyze the way in which depression-related disorders were diagnosed by psychiatrists in this period using the first version of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-I) and the treatments that followed. Using narrative analysis of psychiatrists’ notes, I examine the tensions around framing depression as reactive rather than neurochemical, ultimately illuminating the inadequacy of DSM-I language as a classificatory scheme. Using basic statistical analysis of psychiatrists’ meeting minutes, I present the frequency of depression, showing diagnostic trends by gender, age, and race. Given that depression is so prevalent in American psychiatry and U.S. society today, this historical case study offers a critique on the development of diagnostic language and treatment, while revealing the problems gendered and racialized constructs have created in both institutionalization and community mental health care over time.