| Manfred Sakel | |
|---|---|
| Born | June 6, 1900 Nadwórna |
| Died | December 2, 1957 New York City |
| Nationality | United States |
| Alma mater | University of Vienna |
| Known for | insulin shock therapy |
Manfred Joshua Sakel (June 6, 1900 – December 2, 1957) was an Jewish Austrian (later Austrian-American) neurophysiologist and psychiatrist, credited with developing insulin shock therapy in 1927.
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Sakel was born on June 6, 1900, in Nadwórna, in the former Austria-Hungary Empire (now Ukraine), which was part of Poland between the world wars. Sakel studied Medicine at the University of Vienna from 1919 to 1925, specializing in neurology and neuropsychiatry. In 1933 he became a researcher at the University of Vienna's Neuropsychiatric Clinic. In 1936, he chose to emigrate from Austria to the United States of America. In the USA, he became an attending physician and researcher at the Harlem Valley State Hospital.
Dr. Sakel was the developer of insulin shock therapy in 1927 while a young doctor in Vienna, that would become widely used on individuals with schizophrenia and other mental patients. He noted that insulin-induced coma and convulsions, due to the low level of glucose attained in the blood (hypoglycemic crisis), had a short-term appearance of changing the mental state of drug addicts and psychotics, sometimes dramatically so. He reported that up to 88% of his patients improved with insulin shock therapy, but most other people reported more mixed results and it was eventually shown that patient selection had been biased and that it didn't really have any specific benefits and had many risks, adverse effects and fatalities. However, his method became widely applied for many years in mental institutions worldwide. In the USA and other countries it was gradually dropped by the 1970s. It has been noted that patients would have been terrified of the procedure. Most professionals who were involved are now ashamed, recalling it as inhumane and unscientific, although they may have had the impression of efficacy in the narrow confines of isolated insulin shock units with much extra personal attention and support given to the cherry-picked patients.[1]
Dr. Sakel died from a heart attack[2] on December 2, 1957, in New York City, NY, USA.