Three Decades in the Observation and Treatment of Ulcerative Colitis

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Abstract
Review of experience in psychosomatic factors in this disease at the Presbyterian Hospital, N.Y.C. since first described there by C. Murray in 1930. Report on 57 cases treated psychotherapeutically, including 5 psychoanalyzed patients. Methodology discussed including point system for evaluation of somatic and psychiatric follow-up. Positive findings include the fact that the psychiatric diagnosis is an important consideration for prognosis; medical and psychiatric. Although schizophrenics comprized only one-third of the total group, more than one-half the patients coming to operation and almost two-thirds of those who died were schizophrenic.. Two-thirds of the 57 cases were diagnosed as personality disorders with only 3 psychoneurotic and 1 psychiatrically undiagnosed patient. Of the 48 living patients, 4 had excellent responses to psychotherapy, 27 good responses, 6 moderate, 8 no significant change and 3 poor responses. The 5 completely psychoanalyzed patients showed on the average a greater degree of psychological improvement than the unanalyzed ones. Processing of the data on the effect of psychotherapy on the natural course of the disease of these patients compared with that of matched controls of a non-psychiatrically treated group has not yet been completed.

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