It is unclear at what stage the mental hospitals and LD institutions began to employ pharmacists.
Early mental health and learning disability pharmacy
It is unclear at
what stage the mental hospitals and LD institutions began to employ pharmacists.
Although treatments such as insulin shock and medicines such as paraldehyde,
barbiturates and bromides were popular before the 1950s, it is likely that any
requirements for medicines were managed, in the main, by nurses. The
therapeutic revolution following the introduction of chlorpromazine in the late
1940s increased the requirements for a wide range of medicines. However, the
isolated nature of the institutions and social attitudes towards mental illness
and LD resulted in such employment being unappealing. Typically, such
dispensaries were situated between the segre-gated male and female parts of the
institutions and the medicines passed through separate hatches so as to
minimise the requirements for crossing sectors or for contact between patients
and dispensary staff. Despite these problems there were examples of
well-developed pharmacy services, for example, Central Hospital, Warwick.
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