As I read Nelly Bly's account of her experience in Blackwell, I identified a number of patterns and/or themes with patients, nurses, and doctors as well as with the general operation of the institution (e.g., food, heat, beds, etc). In your reply, discuss the patterns or themes you identified in the reading. Then, imagine an expose like "Ten Days" occurred today...a confederate journalist, posing as a person with mental illness...would he/she receive a diagnosis? would he/she see similar patterns to the ones you identified in Nelly Bly's account? Answer these questions and then reply to at least 3 of your classmates' replies.
One of the most common themes among the nurses was the pushing of the patients to act out. They taunted them and tried to make them act “crazy”. She even talked about some of the taunting of one of the nurses in her own person account,“This is charity, and you should be thankful for what you get" (pg 38). No matter how hard Nellie or the other patients tried to convince them, the doctors, didn’t believe them or just chose to ignore it. Which is another common theme that I found in Nellie’s experience. Another thing that was prominent was the lack of care and lack of clean necessities. They bathed in dirty tubs and water, used used dirty towels, was given the bare minimum amount of clothing to wear even when they complained of being cold, and their beds could barely be considered a mattress.
ReplyDeleteI think that in today’s society a journalist posing as a person with a mental illness would receive a diagnosis. I don’t think that it’s very hard to fake a mental illness with some research and good acting. As far as the treatment they would receive, you hope that they don’t experience the same things that Nellie did, but you hear lots of stories of patients only leaving the facility after death. Obviously, these stories don’t reflect all facilities, but there are some that I’m sure have nurses who taunt patients and doctors who turn their backs. It’s all about power and the nurses have power over the patients, and that makes them easy targets.
Nowadays, it definitely seems like people don't leave unless they have died in the facility or they have filed a lawsuit against the facility. The things Nellie endured in 10 days were absolutely atrocious, and I read about so many horrible things happening to people in psychiatric hospitals in present day times. It is honestly, too easy to fake having a mental illness, and so many people use that to their advantage to get medication.
DeleteI agree with what you said about the treatment of facilities today, as much as we would hope there are definitely still problems with nurses and doctors who taunt patients and not caring for them in the way they should.
DeleteI think that the length of time that individuals stay in an inpatient care is different now. Individuals are spending more time in ERs waiting for a crisis bed (most insurances will only approve an inpatient visit for 3-5 days for emergency care before the hospital has to have a longer stay reapproved). This is more so there is a quicker turn around for the beds that are needed by other people (not to mention the wait list for crisis beds in ME is ridiculous). I also think that the type of lack of care that we see is also different now as well. I think that right now we are seeing more abuse experiences with inpatient care regarding staff and patients. However, I think that we are seeing more neglect/lack of care in emergency rooms as individuals are waiting for care that they need. Medications are being pushed harder as an alternative to inpatient care (medications are cheaper than a week in crisis).
DeleteThe biggest theme I noticed was the sharing of everything for example towels and combs, and not everybody had the same level of cleanliness. Another theme I noticed was the rudeness and overall lack of care the nurses had for the patients...the nurses lashed out whenever a patient even spoke up or asked a question. It really is awful, the experiences Nellie endured over her ten days. One thing that made me cringe was when she had to take the cold bath, I have a hard time if the shower water gets luke warm, so I can not even imagine taking an ice cold bath, and then not being able to dry off properly or wear something warm afterwards.
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately, I think nowadays it would be just as easy to fake a mental illness, and get a diagnosis. Not to generalize, but it seems like most of the time when you go see your primary care physician it's highly probable that you will leave with a prescription for at least one medication. There are many instances of mistreatment in psychiatric facilities today, and as awful as it is, I do not see it changing. Our view of people who have mental illness has gotten broader, and not as narrow-minded and judgmental BUT many people are still quick to judge and have a strong opinion, despite the research that has been done, over the years, on mental illness and how people CAN live normal lives.
You definitely have a point that it would be too easy to fake a mental illness and end up leaving with a diagnosis and at least one type of medication. Which is actually pretty scary as to how easy it is in today's society to get prescribed a medication, due to how many people come be addicted to medications.
DeleteI like what you said about sharing items within the hospital. I think it shows that the nurses were just doing the bare minimum for the patients and they didn't care enough about them to give each lady their own comb and towel. Imagine how easy it would have been to pass a cold or flu around to each patient in those conditions.
DeleteI think one thing that people forget to take into account with the nurses and providers is the high amount of burnout that they have had to go through. This is not an easy field to be in now for burnout rates, let alone when there was a high amount of crowding for individuals in facilities. When you also factor in the needs of each single individual the process of the day continuously gets longer for them, and also factor in the amount of education that each staff had in the human services field, there is no wonder why it happened. Not justifying just playing devils advocate. Not everyone was meant to be in this field, but how many other jobs were out there for women at the time as well? Just a thought..
DeleteA theme that I noticed was that the nurses were all rude and did not seem to care. They all would belittle the patients and were not caring towards their needs. Nurses would not try and be quiet when they check in on the patients at night, they would tell patients to "shut up" when they asked for things such as when Nellie asked for her book and pencil. The patients were only asking simple questions about their needs and the nurses would just push them a side. Another theme that I noticed was that everything was shared and reused. They shared the same cold and dirty baths, the combs they used to brush everyones hair, the towels they use to wash their faces. They also reuse the same cup for tea and their soup they have at dinner. When I read this I had a thought of if they wash the cup before reusing it. Everything else was dirty and not washed but she did not say anything about the cup being clean.
ReplyDeleteIf a journalist today posed as someone with a mental illness they most certainly would have a diagnosis. Everything today seems to have a diagnosis whether there is something truly wrong or not. As for the treatment they would get in a hospital I would hope that they would not experience the same thing that Nellie had. Medical treatment has improved a lot since then so I would hope that how it is given would also be improved.
I do think that the attitudes in nurses and doctors today are still prevalent. There are bad people everywhere and I have run into many instances where I have had bad nurses and doctors. It all depends on how they think of you as a patient.
DeleteI felt as if it was wrong for the nurses to be rude and loud when patients would be sleeping at night. And that all the patients also had to share and reuse everything even baths and some other hygiene care products that usually most people would not share.
DeleteI agree with you, I was surprised that they had not cleaned the dishes and the fact that they made them bathe in the same nasty bath water. I wonder if part of that has to do with where we are in time and our understanding of germs if that was different back in this time. Did they have the same understanding of germs and the fact that things must be sanitized for it to be safe?
DeleteI also noticed this pattern of rude nurses and wrote about it in my response. I was really shocked at some of the things the nurses said to the patients. My mom is a nurse and she works at a nursing home with patients who have dementia or alzheimer's. I have visited her many times and I could not imagine her or the other nurses talking to patients that way or taunting them.
DeleteI agree I think it would be improved but I do think there is still a lot of stigma that people receive when they are in psychiatric hospitals. As well as people still having to do excatly what nurses and doctors ask. When you're locked in a facility there is only so much freedom you have and you can only eat what they have, when they have it but when you don't want what they have or you fight it you become a problem. I think that these facilities ask a lot of their patients.
DeleteThis really makes you think about the lack of resources that these places had. The patients were not taken care of and the nurses had little regard for dirty conditions they were exposed to. It is amazing that anyone could ever survive in a place like this.
DeleteDo you think it is possible that a journalist conducting the same experiment today would be treated badly in a psychiatric facility? I know that I personally do, but I also don't believe it is a guarantee either because not every nurse is necessarily going to treat their patients horribly like the Nellie's nurses did.
ReplyDeletePersonally I am not sure that they would even make it to having a bed at a facility considering the lack of beds that there are for psychiatric care. I think that it is a bit different now because there are so many job options for people, it is hard to get stuck in this field if you aren't meant for it. I also agree with you saying that it is not a guarantee because in my time with this field I have met some phenomenal nursing staff and providers for psychiatric care, but I also understand that everyone has their own breaking point that they can hit with the right amount of pressure that could cause them to do something regrettable.
DeleteA theme I noticed was that all the staff were rude and didn't care about the patients and their health it seemed like. What really stuck out to me and showed me that they didn't care was the first supper that she experienced. They were yelled at to go stand in the hallway where it was brutally cold to the point where they were all shivering. There was also them yelling to the patients and not showing patience towards then when own their way to the dinner. And then the other thing that stuck out to me was what they ate for dinner and how they felt as if they had to shove it all down because thats the only thing they were given to eat. Another pattern I saw that stuck out to me was they went to the bathroom to clean up and even that didn't seem very clean. There wasn't much of them being clean with using ice-cold water and soap, just the way they proceeded to forcefully and not fully wash the patients I thought was shocking.
ReplyDeleteIf a journalist today were to pose as someone with a mental illness, they would have to have a diagnosis. I would come to think that treatment in a facility today, they would not experience the same things as Nellie did. I know a lot of care and medical treatments have been improved and there also a lot more laws for treatments to patients and how they are treated.
I wrote about a similar theme. The overall condition of the hospital itself was disgusting, and I felt that because the staff didn't care to begin with they were able to look at the patients as animals and justified the way they treated them.
DeleteIt's disturbing to me that the patients could barely stomach the food and were forced to bath in those nasty conditions.
I also believe that the hospital had poor conditions and I felt dirty just reading the stories. The patients were treated like prisoners that deserved to be punished, but they did nothing wrong. How is someone supposed to heal from they mental state in a place where they feel so cold and dirty?
DeleteI know.. I can't believe the lack of hygiene back then.. can you imagine?? I wonder if they ever medicated people who they thought they couldn't control through the food they were eating..
DeleteI also wrote about a similar theme of the nurses being rude and not caring for the patients. The patients were treated more like inmates than patients by the nurses, in my opinion. You also mention the unsanitary conditions which was another thing that stood out to me while reading about Nellie's experience. I can't believe they had multiple patients use the same dirty bath water.
DeleteI wrote about a similar theme too. It was hard for me to grasp why a person would go into this field to care for people with mental illnesses, or even be nurses or doctors at all if they didn't want to care for them. When you decide to be a nurse or a doctor you know exactly what the job requires of you. It is mind boggling to me that anyone would go into this profession if they didn't intend to care for people with mental illness the way they should've.
DeleteI noticed that in many instances, people were always talking over Nellie as if she was a ghost as if she wasn't even there. The judge talked over her to the assistant matron and police officer. The nurses and doctors talked over her. It's defintely something that stems from people having "power" over those with a mental illness, there is no respect.
ReplyDeleteI do believe that this is a common problem to this day. A lot of people don't know how to act around someone with a disability or mental illness, they're either very timid, or highly conscience of everything they are saying. It's interesting that people can't treat others with respect and normality just like they would with anyone else.
I do believe that if Nellie were to do that in this day and age, then it may not be all that different, although I do believe she would have to exhibit a bit different symptoms. I do think that doctors and sometimes nurses talk over their patients to either coworkers, parents or someone who is "more capable" of understanding what it is that is being discussed.
Now that you mention it that was a major issue that I had not noticed as much before. I have clients I work with and when we go out into the community and to the doctors or even to a restaurant they often ask me information about them. They are almost shocked when I tell them to ask him the questions because after all they are about him! My client is more than capable of answering these questions, they don't have to refer to me about it.
DeleteI just wonder with time if society will realize that they can answer the questions on their own the majority of the time, and more often than not they can at least understand what is being asked of them.
I agree I think doctors talk over patients a lot and tend to think they know whats going on more than the patient. Doctors might know what symptoms mean what but if they're not taking the time to look at the patients history and such then how are they effectively helping them? I think this goes back to what we talked about before, people doing thing for others because "it's whats best for them" or "for their own good"
DeleteOne of the most common themes I noticed was the lack of care from hospital doctors and nurses. I think all of the bad conditions go back to their lack of not caring for the patients, maybe even the staff not thinking the patients were worthy of human decency. In a sense they dehumanized the patients in order to tell themselves that it was okay to treat them as they did.
ReplyDeleteOther parts to their lack of caring goes into the patients being fed disgusting and spoiled food. The patients did their best to keep it down but there's only so much you can do when you are given rotten food. Another part to the lack of caring goes into the patients requesting more clothes or even blankets, the staff just shrug it off or tell them to shut up. All these women want are the basic necessities, and to be treated as human beings.
The conditions that these women were forced to face seemed to be a continuous cycle - bad food, nasty conditions, no warmth, continuous boredom, no adequate medical treatment, forcibly drugged, and forced to take baths in disgusting water.
I'm sure if this was done today a 'mentally ill' confederate would absolutely notice that conditions are far from ideal. They would most definitely be given some sort of diagnosis because without the diagnosis the hospital would not get refunded from insurance/state without it. Today we rely heavily on labels to help determine what kind of 'treatment' is best for the patient.
I think the confederate would find that the food in today's mental hospitals are not as nasty as the one that Nellie Bly was forced to deal with, but that the food is far from good. In addition they might not be given adequate medical treatment and could be given 'treatments' that aren't doing anything to help the actual patient.
I think it is important to point out that the patients were put on a cycle (of poor care). The women sent they to be treated, but the nurses and doctors only cared to give them just enough to keep them alive, although I would not be surprised if patients died while living in those conditions. They had no rights and when they tried to speak out, they were punished.
DeleteI also believe we have a long way to go when it comes to treatments and diagnosis, but I'm glad that things are getting better instead of getting worse.
One of the themes that I noticed while reading was Nellie's belief that sane patients would become insane due to the treatment they had endured while at the hospital. By being forced to stand in the cold, eat disgusting food, and be tortured by the nurses, patients were likely to act out. Especially sitting in one room all day with nothing to do, it would be easy for patients to become "insane" from the boredom. Another thing that shocked me was how the doctors barely did anything when they were told what the nurses were doing to the patients. They had the authority and the chance to change things within the hospital but decided to believe that the actions of the nurses was okay. Patients were but in the asylums to get help and it shocks me that the idea of helping back them was to torture the mental illness out of the patients.
ReplyDeleteI believe that if a journalist decided to pose as a mental illness patient, he or she would most likely get a diagnosis. Even without a history of mental illness, if the journalist were to act out symptoms, doctors would give them a diagnosis because it is required by most insurance companies to have a diagnosis to pay for any treatment in the first place. With that being said, mental health facilities have grown a lot since this story came out and patients are treated more fairly and people working with them actually want to help, instead of cause more pain.
You raise some interesting points, many of them crossed my mind while reading. I agree with the idea of patients being checked in, in search of some help and ultimately seeming to get worse from the treatment and conditions that they are living in. The fact that the doctors heard about the treatment and did nothing is also appalling. My thoughts on why the nurses chose to treat the patients the way they did is just because they could. The nurses have more "power" than the patients and they take full advantage of that. I think that mental health facilities have made many improvements, but I also think that there are many facilities that fall into the same patterns that we read about in the story.
DeleteI agree. If I was abused and battered by nurses and endured the treatments that these patients did, I believe I would have acted out as well. I certainly would have protested an ice-cold bath in a tub of dirty, used water. After continuous bad treatment from the nurses, bad "meals' and verbal abuse, I believe I would be acting out enough to appear to exhibit symptoms of being "crazy".
DeleteThe reason sane patients turn insane is from the physical and mental breaking down that the institution uses to keep patients docile enough to control. Nellie was smart and was eager to speak up or fight back against the nurses. Maybe the nurses respected that to a degree or found it as a new source of entertainment, otherwise they could have had Nellie endure a few electroshock treatments to help with her attitude adjustment. Also, mental illness is hard to treat without proper training and resources, so the doctors could have tried harder if they wanted to but most seemed to brush off everything from boredom and blame it on the patients "delusions".
DeleteI agree with your theme. I find it very interesting to think about how it's possible that these individuals were not as mentally ill as they became due to the mistreatment they experienced. I know that most people would eventually feel like they were going insane if they were forced to live in those conditions, especially if they were forced to do nothing and be completely bored constantly. That for sure would make a person feel like there was something seriously wrong with them.
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ReplyDeleteOne theme that stood out to me was the attitudes and behaviors of the nurses. It seemed as though they did not care about the patients at all. It felt to me like the nurses treated the patients more like inmates. During Nellie's accounts of her first supper, the nurse's behavior really stood out to me. The patients were ordered to wait outside in the cold hall, thinly dressed for 15 minutes. Then the nurses begin ordering the patients around again, barking out commands: "'How many times must I tell you to keep in line?'" and "'Stand still'". Some patients were most likely fidgeting and moving around to keep warm. It seemed so strict and structured, all for a terrible "meal" for dinner that did not satisfy the hunger of many patients.
ReplyDeleteI think it could be possible for a reporter today to go undercover as Nellie did. Unfortunately, I think there are still nurses (or doctors) in the field today who may have similar attitudes and behaviors as the ones Nellie described. There have been news stories and articles about patient abuse at facilities still happening today.
I saw the same themes with the nurses. It seemed like the nurses went out of their way to treat the patients badly. When Nellie described the meals is disgusted me just reading it, I can't even imagine trying to eat it. I also agreed with what you said in your second paragraph. I think that some facilities have made major improvements and actually care about the well being of patients, but some places still show similar behaviors to the ones in Nellie's story.
DeleteMy theory, because I hope nurses and doctors are better than this today, is that nurses and doctors do really care about their patients but after a long time working with many difficult patients they get burnt out and they do not realize this and no one tells them. Then because of the burnout nurses and doctors form these attitudes towards their patients. I am not saying that makes any of it okay. I would just really like to believe that people in those fields are doing their best. I think being proactive about burn out should be more important for people in these positions.
DeleteI noticed the same themes with how the nurses treated the patients and it disgusted me! I like that you said "meal" in quotes because it really should not have been considered a meal. If there are news stories about patients still being beaten in facilities, I hope that justice was served and the nurses was fired. I believe that today, there is many more eyes on facilities because of how much technology has evolved and would like to think they did not just get away with it.
DeleteI was surprised with the theme of Nellie telling of all the bad things happening to the doctors or requesting things from the staff, that Nellie wasn't beaten more because of her complaints. As the other patients around her were suffering from even small bouts of disobedience, she was only threatened or told to shut up, although the nurses seemed eager to use physical punishment. Also, the never-ending cycle of the food making the women sick and then they’re too sick to eat, but need to eat to get better was unfortunate.
ReplyDeleteI feel that a journalist getting a diagnosis in this time could go either way, either they would be recognized as a fraud eventually with inconsistencies or be convincing enough after a few visits to the doctor that they would be labeled for life, disproved later on or not. There would probably be many patterns similar to Nellie’s such as the food or bedding resources, but the attendant abuse would be reversed. There has been many laws in place to protect the patients from any kind of retaliation from attendants, but has caused the attendants to be attacked by violent patients with no way to fight back if necessary for their own safety.
I think that less physical punishment was used with Nellie because she acted more competent than some of the other women. Even though the nurses weren't really worried about the doctors finding out what they were doing but I think Nellie made them a little nervous and made them think twice about using physical punishment with her. The topic of retaliation of the patients on the nurses is interesting. You never really hear these cases in media, you only hear when negative things happen to the patients. I'm wondering if you know of any cases where patients retaliated against the nurses?
DeleteI think that the nurses used less physical punishment on Nellie because like Kaitlyn said she acted more competent, but also because she was looked at as a special case. When they were on that big walk, all of the other nurses kept asking who she was, and she got her own room at the facility. So I think that those two things combined may have helped her.
DeleteThis is a good point, Nelly probably made the nurses question their own questionable decisions because Nelly did probably act differently than others in there. But I also think that Nelly would have lost her strong sense of self being in a place like that for too long.
DeleteI found a few trends through out the story, one is that the patients are referred to as crazy by herself and the doctors/nurses, however, she does mention that some of the patients are sane and do not belong there like herself. I find it appalling that people ended up in the asylum for no reason. Another trend I noticed was that Doctors, nurses and others (at the housing for women) really responded to her in two ways, which was to instantly be afraid of her or they would tell her what to do and if it wasn't done or she refused they would threaten her. Through the entire story she was threaten and told that punishment would be worse if she did not corporate. Due to that I would say another trend was that her and the other patients concerns and demands were ignored. A few times the nurses even said, "people on charity should not expect anything and should not complain"
ReplyDeleteSadly I think it would be easy for someone to get get diagnosed with a mental illness and not really have one. I've seen a video were a person went into five or six different doctors offices with the same symptoms but all the doctors diagnose the individual with different disorders and prescribed different medication. I think the stigma surrounding mental illness is still the same. People still might say "they're crazy" or like Nellie not really listen to their needs and wants because they think they know whats best for them. I do hope psychiatric facilities are treating their patients better than this today. I have heard a lot of negative stories surrounding facilities, which is concerning.
I also noticed the statement "people on charity should not expect anything and should not complain," repeated many times by nurses. That disgusts me. I feel that saying that to the people who are forced to be in this asylum is ridiculous because they didn't necessarily ask for the charity and might have been better off if they were not forced into this facility.
DeleteI was surprised when one patient, not named, who Nellie spoke to was sent to the institution after applying to be sent to a poorhouse while she looked for work. She was penniless with family problems and nowhere to go, but she never expected to be sent to an insane asylum. Also, her first days there was made hell after the nurses gave her a bath after a doctor told her not to for whatever disease she was suffering from.
DeleteI noticed a couple of significant themes in this story. One of the biggest ones was how the nurses acted towards the patients. They treated the patients as prisoners, being extremely rude and not really caring what the have to say or if they got enough food or sleep. I also noticed the lack of education multiple nurses had, so they had no business caring for anybody. Another major theme I noticed was quality of food and clothes given to the patients. They did not get enough or even any quality food. This shows that these patients really mean nothing to the asylum and the people running it which is very sad. The clothes did not sound adequate to the temperatures maintained in the facility which also shows how the facility feels about the patients.
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately, I believe it would be easy to be diagnosed with a mental illness today. I feel that doctors might not diagnose it as a severe mental illness, but I seriously doubt it would be hard to gain an untrue diagnosis. I would hope facilities today would treat their patients better. I assume that because of technology and such that it would be impossible to not get shut down if they really still treated patients in the was they did in this story.
Technology is a very important topic to bring up because it allows the public to be so much more aware of important issues. I think that technology has contributed so much in making sure that patients are treated right.
DeletePerhaps the state couldn't afford to give the possibly overcrowded asylum the resources it needed. The food was really bad, but maybe the doctors had been the ones with the money to bring in the good food for the staff. And the clothes such as shawls and hats, shouldn't have been withheld only for walks. Miss Maynard as well as many of the other suffering patients, could have used the extra article, especially when fits would occur from lack of blood to the brain.
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ReplyDeleteA common theme that stood out to me was the types of punishments that Nelly and the other patients had to endure. The were subjected to poor living conditions, lack of food edible food, and hygiene. We have learned that Nelly was not the only person to be living in these conditions without having a diagnosis. Many orphans and homeless people were placed in asylums. As for how the nurses treated the patients just goes to show the stigma that the mentally ill had. They had no respect and were not even treated like humans. This also makes me think about how overworked these nurses had to be to lose all sense of morality and not feel bad for how they were treating these people.
ReplyDeleteToday I think that we nurses still have an issue with being overworked but there are so many rules and regulations in place to ensure that patients are treated well. There is still a large issue with misdiagnosis but the care of patients is so much better that accuracy has improved.