THE HISTORY OF ENCEPHALITIS LETHARGICA: AN ITALIAN CURE FOR A DISEASE STILL LITTLE KNOWN. THE EXPERIENCE OF THE SIENA PSYCHIATRIC HOSPITAL IN THE fiRST HALF OF THE XX CENTURY IN A MUSEUM AND ARCHIVE RESEARCH

Starting from the 1920s, the care and management of many post-encephalitis patients who survived the acute phase of encephalitis lethargica were often entrusted to psychiatric hospitals due to the psychic complications of the disease. Antonio D’Ormea, director of the psychiatric hospital of Siena from 1909 to 1952, tried to treat these patients through exclusively symptomatic treatments, as occurred in other similar structures or treatment centers. His meticulous activity lasted several decades and he made interesting and innovative experiences, carefully documenting the results achieved. He implemented a series of procedures, collected photographs, and documented treatment progresses, failures, and scientifically relevant details, thus creating a unique archival collection of absolute value. We were able to retrieve unpublished material from the historical archive of the Sienese psychiatric hospital by searching among the dusty but still intact medical records. We were thus able to indentify the treatment methods that had been tested, including the famous “Bulgarian cure”, a “very individual” remedy, as Prof. Antonio D’Ormea himself described it.