Applying experimental data obtained in animals to understand the pathophysiological mechanisms of nervous disorders in patients in I. P. Pavlov clinics

Abstract

Having studied the physiology of higher nervous activity in animals since 1901, Ivan Petrovich Pavlov simultaneously began to devote great attention to the physiological understanding of human mental activity in normal conditions and in various pathological states. In 1918 he began to visit the Psychiatric Hospital in Udelnaya, and later studied the patient histories in the psychiatric clinic of the Women’s Medical Institute. By the 1930s, Pavlov’s laboratories had accumulated vast experience in studying animal higher nervous activity not only in the norm, but also in various pathologies. Since the 1920s, experimental neuroses were successfully induced in test dogs applying various stimuli and their combinations. It was proven that the strength and depth of a neurosis depended on the type of the dog’s nervous system. The classification of these types, according to Pavlov, largely coincided with the classical types of temperament defined by Hippocrates (phlegmatic, sanguine, choleric and melancholic). Experimental neuroses were treated with various methods (bromide preparations, recesses in experiments, etc.). Pavlov was confident that the accumulated experience of studying pathological processes in the higher nervous activity of animals could be used to successfully treat patients with nervous and mental diseases, and his conviction in the matter led to the establishment of the Pathophysiology of Higher Nervous Human Activity Department at the Institute of Experimental Medicine (IEM) on October 6, 1931. The department supervised two new clinics — a psychiatric and a neurosis one, where psychiatrists and physiologists joined their efforts in administering treatment to the patients. For the first time in the history of Russian neuropathology, the physiological analysis of nervous and mental illnesses, such as neurasthenia, psychasthenia, hysteria, and also schizophrenia, narcolepsy, manic-depressive psychosis, etc., was conducted. A detailed pathophysiological analysis of more than 200 patients’ medical histories was produced as a result of this effort. Transcripts of clinical conferences were published between 1954 and 1957 in the form of a three-volume edition of “Pavlov’s Clinical Wednesdays” (1931–1936).