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ABSTRACT
The paper considers the case of vegetovascular dystonia, one of the most typical and common “Soviet” diseases. This syndrome emerged in Soviet medicine after World War II, and very quickly become a popular diagnosis among physicians. The author describes how the construct of vegetovascular dystonia was formed and developed, what changes it underwent, and what affected those changes. The concept and history of vegetovascular dystonia can provide an understanding of Soviet medicine and health science in general.
RÉSUMÉ
L’article examine le cas de la dystonie végéto-vasculaire, une des maladies « soviétiques » les plus typiques et le plus répandues. Ce syndrome est apparu dans la médecine soviétique après la Deuxième Guerre mondiale, et il est rapidement devenu un diagnostic populaire parmi les médecins. L’auteure décrit la formation et le développement de la construction de la dystonie végéto-vasculaire, les modifications qu’elle a subies, et les influences sur ces modifications.
Le concept et l’histoire de la dystonie végéto-vasculaire peuvent nous aider à comprendre la médecine soviétique et la science de la santé en général.
Acknowledgments
I thank Ivan Simic for this Special Edition. I am grateful to Canadian Slavonic Papers/Revue canadienne des slavistes editor Heather Coleman and editorial assistant Bradley Smith for their suggestions and help, and to the anonymous reviewers, who provided very insightful comments.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.
Notes
1. Yap, “Culture-Bound Reactive Syndromes”; Yap, “Words and Things.”
2. Sumathipala, Siribaddana, and Bhugra, “Culture-Bound Syndromes”; Avasthir and Jhirwal, “Concept and Epidemiology.”
3. Carr and Tan, “In Search of the True Amok”; Saint Martin, “Running Amok.”
4. Lewis-Fernandez et al., “Ataque de Nervios”; Keough, Timpano, and Schmidt, “Ataques de nervios.”
5. Landy, “Pibloktoq (Hysteria) and Inuit Nutrition”; Parker, “Eskimo Psychopathology”; Higgs, “Pibloktoq.”
6. Cheng, “Critical Review of Chinese Koro”; Ang and Weller, “Koro and Psychosis”; Chowdhury, “Hundred Years of Koro.”
7. Khristoforova, Ikota.
8. Khristoforova, “Stryakh i nadsada.”
9. Ionesku, Serdechno-sosudistye rasstroistva.
10. Pokalev, Neirotsirkuliatornaia distoniia.
11. Vein, Voznesenskaia, and Vorob'eva, Vegetativnye rasstroistva.
12. Zin'kovskii, “O diagnostike vegeto-sosudistoi distonii.”
13. Vasil'ev, Strel'tsova, and Dubova, “Neirotsirkuliatornaia distoniia.”
14. There are a few studies on the history of neurasthenia in Russia: a chapter on neurasthenia in the social and cultural environment of late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Russia in each of Irina Sirotkina’s books: Sirotkina, Diagnosing Literary Genius, 117–44; Sirotkina, Klassiki i psikhiatry, 152–87. See also Laura Goering’s article on neurasthenia and national identity in nineteenth-century Russia: Goering, “‘Russian Nervousness’.”
15. Korsakov, Kurs psikhiatrii, 1007–8.
16. Ibid., 1008–9.
17. Goering, “‘Russian Nervousness’,” 35.
18. For instance, Mikhail Droznes, a psychiatrist from Odessa, emphasizes “the need to eliminate as soon as possible the etiological factor responsible for the increase in nervous and mental illnesses in the population – oppressive and bureaucratic social order, repressing the freedom of the individual.” Droznes, “Vazhneishiie zadachi,” 213. Bekhterev, a well-known Russian neurologist, includes in the causes of neurasthenia, first, the absence of political rights and freedom responsible for the “lack of vitality” of the people, which threatens the mental health of the nation, and second, capitalism and the social gap between the rich and the poor. Bekhterev, “Voprosy vyrozhdeniia,” 518–20.
19. Sechenov, Izbrannye proizvedeniia, vol. 1, 168.
20. Sechenov, Reflexes of the Brain, 63.
21. Ibid., 43.
22. Ibid., 106.
23. Cited in: Sirotkina, Klassiki i psikhiatry, 174.
24. Cited in: Ibid., 173.
25. Pavlov, Polnoe sobranie sochinenii, vol. 3, part 1, 38.
26. Pavlov, Refleks svobody, 181.
27. See Etkind, Eros Nevozmozhnogo.
28. Popov, “Nevrasteniia,” 49.
29. Kannabikh, Istoriia psikhiatrii, 454.
30. When in this part of the text I use concepts such as “trauma,” “traumatic neurosis,” “war neurosis,” or “post-traumatic stress disorder,” I do not accept them as objective and neutral, but realize that they formed within and belong to Western biomedicine and psychology. I do not consider them to be exemplary states or illnesses that Soviet medicine failed to reach; rather, I use those notions here to draw parallels with those states that we can find in Soviet medicine.
31. Lang, Gipertonicheskaia bolezn'.
32. Razdol'skii, “Obshchie dannye,” 263.
33. Ibid., 264.
34. Ibid.
35. Ozeretskii, “Psikhicheskie izmeneniia,” 274.
36. Ibid.
37. Ozeretskii, “Psikhicheskie izmeneniia,” 276; Svetnik and Safonova, “Ranniaia nevrologicheskaia semiotika.”
38. Lang, Gipertonicheskaia bolezn', 163–4.
39. Ibid., 165.
40. In the 1940s, Lang came up with the idea that the damage caused by emotional exhaustion of the nervous system is the main cause of essential hypertension. Obviously, this idea is based on Pavlov’s principle of nervism. Eventually, Lang’s version of hypertension became the cornerstone for Soviet cardiology.
41. Lang, Gipertonicheskaia bolezn', 166.
42. Ibid., 301.
43. Ibid., 317.
44. Merridale, “Collective Mind,” 48.
45. Khoroshko, Ucheniye o nevrozakh, 125.
46. Miasishchev, Lichnost' i nevrozy, 188.
47. Davidenkov, “Vvedenie,” 22.
48. Miasnikov, Gipertonicheskaia bolezn' i ateroskleroz, 77.
49. This leads to a very original concept of cardiology which simultaneously deals with cardiovascular diseases and neuroses. For example, Zelenin’s book on hypertension (1956) includes a large chapter on neuroses. Zelenin, Bolezni serdechno-sosudistoi sistemy, 90–108. I believe that this construct of hypertension and the concept of cardiology interconnected with constructs of “chest pain” and “blood pressure” as symbols of emotional distress.
50. Miasnikov, Klassifikatsiia gipertonicheskoi bolezni.
51. Ibid., 5–6.
52. Zelenin, Bolezni serdechno-sosudistoi sistemy; Miasnikov, Gipertonicheskaia bolezn' i ateroskleroz.
53. Zelenin, Bolezni serdechno-sosudistoi sistemy, 92–3.
54. Ibid., 98.
55. Savitskii, “O nomenklature i klassifikatsii.”
56. Makolkin and Abbakumov, Neirotsirkuliatornaia distoniia, 125.
57. Miasnikov, Gipertonicheskaia bolezn' i ateroskleroz, 191.
58. Ibid., 66.
59. Zelenin, Bolezni serdechno-sosudistoi sistemy, 111.
60. Severova, “Voprosy sosudistoi distonii,” 51.
61. Data from the Russian National Research Medical University library.
62. Vein, Solov'eva, and Kolosova, Vegeto-sosudistaia distoniia.
63. Makolkin and Abbakumov, Neirotsirkuliatornaia distoniia.
64. Ibid., 16, 4.
65. Ibid., 146.
66. Ibid., 146.
67. Ibid., 17–18.
68. Ibid., 37–8.
69. Vein, Solov'eva, and Kolosova, Vegeto-sosudistaia distoniia.
70. Ibid., 70.
71. Ibid., 78.
72. Ibid., 136–7.
73. Ibid., 72.
74. Ibid., 77.
75. Ibid., 8.
76. Ibid., 138.
77. Makolkin and Abbakumov, Neirotsirkuliatornaia distoniia, 22.
Additional information
Notes on contributors
Anastasia Beliaeva
Anastasia Beliaeva is Associate Professor of Philosophy at the Pirogov Russian National Research Medical University. She holds a PhD in Philosophy and an MA in Social Anthropology. She is currently working in the field of medical anthropology and social history of Soviet and post-Soviet medicine. Her recent interests include changing constructions of illness, the human body, and medical knowledge in post-Soviet Russia.