Male hysteria in theory and practice: Analyzing patient records of the Tartu Psychiatric Hospital (Estonia), 1881-1895.

During 1881-1895, a small number of male patients-18 in total-were diagnosed with hysteria at the University of Tartu Psychiatric Hospital. Rather than constituting an obscure psychiatric institution on the margins of European medical traditions, Tartu during these years witnessed the arrival of several influential psychiatrists: Hermann Emminghaus (1845-1904), Emil Kraepelin (1856-1926), and Vladimir Chizh (1855-1922). Yet, when comparing patient case records of male hysteria written by doctors who also published journal articles and medical textbooks on the topic, one can detect a clear inconsistency between the theory and practice of psychiatry at an important moment of its formation.

Institutionalization of the insane in the Russian Baltic provinces: a case study of the Hospital for Mental and Nervous Diseases in Tartu, 1881-95.

This article studies the University of Tartu psychiatric hospital and its patient population in the Russian Baltic Province of Livonia in 1881-95, using the hospital's admission registry book as the primary source. Although it was a university clinic following the German academic tradition, both upper- and lower-class patients were admitted (25 and 75 per cent, respectively, of 2,184 hospitalizations), with a median stay of 70 days. Admission and length of stay often depended on a family's or community's financial capabilities.