Stonehearst Asylum

The other week I watched a movie called Stonehearst Asylum, a film loosely based around the short story "The System of Doctor Tarr and Professor Fether" by Edgar Allan Poe. The film centres around a young man who has just finished his medical studies and decides to take up a residency at Stonehearst Asylum. Upon his arrival, the young Dr Newgate is surprised by the state of the asylum - it's apparent lack of orderliness, unorthodox treatment regimens and uncustomarily humane treatment of the patients. However it is not long before Dr Newgate discovers that in fact the real staff of Stonehearst Asylum had been overthrown by the patients and locked away in cells located in the depths of the asylum.

The superintendent who had been acting in charge was no more than a patient of Stonehearst Asylum himself, as were all the other supposed staff.

At that point in the film, when I had realised what had been done to the real staff and how they had been locked away in such miserable and unsanitary conditions, my sympathies immediately went out to them. They were most defintely the good guys and had been unfairly and disgustingly treated. The patients were clearly the imposters - they were clearly the bad guys in the film. Their treatment of the superintendent, other doctors and nursing staff was unjust, inhumane and of utter reproach. They deserved to be found out and to face the consequences of their actions.

Yet as the plot continued to unravel, and we were given flashbacks into how the patients at Stonehearst Asylum had been previously treated under the 'care' of their physicians, my standing began to change. I began to witness the senseless and cruel methods which had been employed to rid these patients of their madness. The drug-induced stupor that had been forced upon them. Prescriptions for rotation therapy and hydrotherapy - barbaric methods with arguably little scientific basis. There was no such care for the dignity of those patients, they had been treated like animals. The doctors weren't the good guys after all.

What got me thinking after watching this film was how misguided and more often than not, ethically questionable, the patterns of thinking and treatment of mentally ill patients was during that time period. A time not all that long ago either! Of course this is just a movie, and movies cannot always be taken as fact. Yet the themes and questions raised by this film are of no light matter. The truth is, mentally ill patients were treated terribly in the past. Some of the methods used to "treat" such patients were despicable and the attitude towards them by many doctors demeaning. It made me sad to think that some of the most educated people of that time could act so terribly towards their fellow man, and all because of their mental state. As doctors we have a duty to serve and protect the most vulnerable in society. Yet when I reflect on the happenings of the past I cannot help but see the arrogance and senselessness of the physicians before us. I am thankful that times have changed since then but we know the stigma surronding mental illness still exists. We have progressed greatly since then, but let us strive to progress still more.

Have you watched the film before? How did you react toward the treatment of the patients of Stonehearst Asylum? Do you think their mistreatment warranted their actions towards the staff?