Abstract
There is no necessary antagonism between the judicious use of drugs and a psychotherapeutic approach to patients in general medical practice. A table is presented with a simple pragmatic classification of types of drugs for altering emotional and mental states. Three general principles are given for the use of such drugs, illustrated by examples of the use and misuse of tranquillizers.
Some differentiation is made between sedatives and tranquillizers and between different types of tranquillizers, particularly with reference to the need to consider depressive features in patients. Suggestions are made for the use of drugs for mild depressions and for depressions accompanying organic disease.
One may have to take an “experimental” approach to new drugs to determine which to them are of value in relation to the particular emotional states of one's own patients.
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