Institutional Treatment of Mental Defectives, with Special Reference to Occupation

Extract

The problem of the treatment of defectives is somewhat different from that met with in regard to the patients in mental hospitals. In the case of mental hospital patients most of them have filled useful positions in the world, and also the percentage of possible recoveries is hopeful, and many of them are able to resume their former occupations. But mental defectives are social misfits, many with anti-social traits, others neglected and ill-treated, and again others of a much lower grade, many of whom are helpless and even cot-cases.