- Joined
- Jan 20, 2014
- Messages
- 413
- Reaction score
- 903
- Points
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- Location
- Kamp-Lintfort/Germany
- Website
- www.tomvandutch.de
After the epidemic erupting in the city, the provincial government of Parma decided in 1873 to relocate the Provincial Psychiatry temporarily to Colorno and remodel the premises of the former Ducal Palace (also called Reggia di Colorno) for the occasion and the former monastery of San Domenico. Over the years, this "temporary" solution became more and more important, so that part of the royal palace (the rear part) was used as a mental hospital in the province until its definitive closure some years after the entry into force of the Barsaglia Act.
Initially, only psychiatric patients were admitted to the hospital, but over time, vagabonds, alcoholics, prostitutes and abandoned children were admitted, all of whom were forced to live in very poor hygienic conditions and treated to the limit of a few square meters , The asylum was more than a health resort, it was a real prison: the windows had bars, the rooms and bathrooms were cold and often locked, and the sick were handcuffed to the bed and tortured. To monitor their patients, the nurses used practices such as electric shock, straitjackets or sticks and treated them as if they were animals. The staff, chosen more for their physical strength than for their professionalism, was kept to a minimum (about 170 nurses for 1,200 patients), and despite the enormous number of patients present who could not be treated, exhausting strata of Isolated from the outside world and removed from their families without having the opportunity to return to a normal life.
The inadequacy of the premises and the help for the patients was repeated several times and with increasing protest, however without success, until 1965 the new provincial council for health and traffic visited Mario Tommasini (1928-2006) to the hospital the cool inhuman situation. Mario Tommasini fought against this inhuman situation by obtaining approval from the right-wing province to cut working hours, hire new professionals and buy new furniture to make life more comfortable inside the healthcare facility. This type of policy leads to considerable disappointment on the part of the hospital management, which is still tied to the old traditional psychiatry. In the late sixties, Parma became the center of debate on Italian psychiatry.
In February 1969, a group of students took possession of the psychiatric hospital and lived there for 35 days to protest the methods and condition of the patients inside them. The patients agreed to this profession by signing a petition requesting the resignation of healthy patients, the elimination of the wake-up call at 6 o'clock and the possibility of going out during the day. The end of the occupation was determined by the outbreak of a group of neo-Nazis armed with iron bars and Molotov cocktails, and by press attacks on Tommasini and the occupying students. In 1970, thanks to the good friendship and cooperation with Tommasini, the Psychiatric Clinic Colorno passed into the hands of psychologist Franco Basaglia until 1971. During this time, the clinic was progressively restructured according to the principles of psychiatry community. Also starting this year, there were a large number of patients who left the hospital, were introduced to the workplace and gradually integrated into society, the same company they had previously ignored. With the entry into force of Law 180, also known as the Barsaglia Law, the Colorno Hospital transferred its administration from the provincial administration to the local health unit to reach sunset and ended its full closure in 1990.
Initially, only psychiatric patients were admitted to the hospital, but over time, vagabonds, alcoholics, prostitutes and abandoned children were admitted, all of whom were forced to live in very poor hygienic conditions and treated to the limit of a few square meters , The asylum was more than a health resort, it was a real prison: the windows had bars, the rooms and bathrooms were cold and often locked, and the sick were handcuffed to the bed and tortured. To monitor their patients, the nurses used practices such as electric shock, straitjackets or sticks and treated them as if they were animals. The staff, chosen more for their physical strength than for their professionalism, was kept to a minimum (about 170 nurses for 1,200 patients), and despite the enormous number of patients present who could not be treated, exhausting strata of Isolated from the outside world and removed from their families without having the opportunity to return to a normal life.
The inadequacy of the premises and the help for the patients was repeated several times and with increasing protest, however without success, until 1965 the new provincial council for health and traffic visited Mario Tommasini (1928-2006) to the hospital the cool inhuman situation. Mario Tommasini fought against this inhuman situation by obtaining approval from the right-wing province to cut working hours, hire new professionals and buy new furniture to make life more comfortable inside the healthcare facility. This type of policy leads to considerable disappointment on the part of the hospital management, which is still tied to the old traditional psychiatry. In the late sixties, Parma became the center of debate on Italian psychiatry.
In February 1969, a group of students took possession of the psychiatric hospital and lived there for 35 days to protest the methods and condition of the patients inside them. The patients agreed to this profession by signing a petition requesting the resignation of healthy patients, the elimination of the wake-up call at 6 o'clock and the possibility of going out during the day. The end of the occupation was determined by the outbreak of a group of neo-Nazis armed with iron bars and Molotov cocktails, and by press attacks on Tommasini and the occupying students. In 1970, thanks to the good friendship and cooperation with Tommasini, the Psychiatric Clinic Colorno passed into the hands of psychologist Franco Basaglia until 1971. During this time, the clinic was progressively restructured according to the principles of psychiatry community. Also starting this year, there were a large number of patients who left the hospital, were introduced to the workplace and gradually integrated into society, the same company they had previously ignored. With the entry into force of Law 180, also known as the Barsaglia Law, the Colorno Hospital transferred its administration from the provincial administration to the local health unit to reach sunset and ended its full closure in 1990.
