Dr Shock speculates that I am busy with Twitter. But that is not the case. I am busy with my historical research on electrotherapy with a focus on magnetic stimulation and psychiatry. Now I am working on the period around 1900.  I found a lot of documents about German magnetotherapy. An electrotechnical engineer Eugen Konrad Müller produced a apparatus that produced an alternating magnetic field with an alternating current.  He claims he saw phosphenes in 1883 when he placed his head near an alternating magnetic field. Around 1900, he founded an institute in Zürich to investigate the effects of the magnetic waves produced by his apparatus. Physicians also got involved. They claimed that the apparatus was able to heal 70% of all conditions caused by an irritated nervous system (for instance neurasthenia) and  vasomotoric problems.  But Müller was not the only one who made an electromagnetic apparatus. The firm Trüb also produced an electromagnetic therapeutic machine. This machine worked with a rotating simple magnet. There was a lot of debate which machine worked and if the machines worked at all.

This is a just a little insight in the research I am doing right now. I want to extend the period to  nowadays and investigate how it came about that magnetic brain stimulation is al around.  I am still looking for interesting articles about magnetotherapy in the UK, France and US around 1900. So if someone has some clues or some interesting links please let me know. The research is not confined the scientific articles. Everything (photos, populair articles, newspaper articles) is interesting.

I would love to go to the exhibition about mental illness and visual arts in Vienna 1900. This would be a nice addition to the things I allready know about this period.

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Dit artikel werd aangemaakt op maandag 4 mei 2009 om 09:59 en werd geplaatst in english, history, research, transcranial magnetic stimulation. U kunt de reacties van dit artikel volgen via de RSS 2.0 feed. Je kan een reactie plaatsen, of een trackback doen van je eigen site.

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