This investigation attempts to determine what effect a sub-convulsive dose of triazol had on the individual patient as compared with a convulsive dose, and in addition to study and compare the reactions of a group of deteriorated schizophrenic patients with those of a heterogeneous group composed of mental disorders not schizophrenic. There were 12 patients in each group. The first group of schizophrenic patients was made up of individuals who showed marked emotional deterioration, with either a poverty of affective response or a definitely inappropriate affect. All these patients had had their mental disorder for many years. The average duration of the psychosis in the schizophrenic group was 9 years, and the average age of the group was 31 years. The heterogeneous group was composed of three patients classified as manic-depressive in the depressed phase, two depressed patients in a stuporous condition, three psychoneurotic patients with chronic anxiety states, and four with chronic obsessive states. The average age of the heterogeneous group was 33 years.

Although the subject of this contribution is somewhat narrow, it is hoped that points raised will have some bearing on matters wider than pure therapeutics.

The present communication is a preliminary report on 12 certifiedcases suffering from insanity with epilepsy treated with solantoin, a preparation of sodium diphenyl hydantoinate. This paper also discusses the site of action of the drug, and the possible relationship between its excretion and toxic effects.

Since Meduna in 1934 introduced the treatment of schizophrenic states by induced epileptiform convulsions, a volume of literature has appeared on the use of cardiazol as convulsant. But although cardiazol proved immensely superior to the original camphor, it is not without some serious disadvantages. These led naturally to the search for further improvement in the convulsant agent, and it is with one of the successors to cardiazol, introduced by Walk and Mayer-Gross (1938), and known as azoman or triazol 156, that this record is concerned.

Within the last few years advances have been made in research in epilepsy which have resulted in new hope for the sufferer and physician alike.

It is just twenty years ago that I read a paper on the “Problem of Psychogenesis in Mental Disease” before this Society. William McDougall, whose recent death we all deplore, was in the chair. What I then said about psychogenesis could be safely repeated to-day, for it has left no visible traces, or other noticeable consequences, either in text-books or in clinics. Although I hate to repeat myself, it is almost impossible to say something wholly new and different about a subject which has not changed its face in the many years that have gone by. My experience, however, has increased and some of my views have matured, but I could not say that my standpoint has had to undergo any radical change. I am therefore in the somewhat uncomfortable situation of one who, on the one hand, believes that he has a well-founded conviction, but, on the other hand, is afraid to indulge in the habit of repeating old stories. Although psychogenesis has been discussed long ago, it is still a modern, even an ultra-modern, problem.