Thomas Story Kirkbride

Thomas Story Kirkbride
File:Thomas Story Kirkbride 001.jpg Kirkbride in 1898
Born	(1809-07-31)July 31, 1809 Morrisville, Pennsylvania
Died	Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Nationality	American
Occupation	Physician
Known for	Kirkbride Plan

This article is about the American Physician Thomas Story Kirkbride. For the British writer, see Thomas Story.

Thomas Story Kirkbride (July 31, 1809 - December 16, 1883) was a physician, advocate for the mentally ill, and founder of the Association of Medical Superintendents of American Institutions for the Insane (AMSAII), a precursor to the American Psychiatric Association.

Early career

Born into a Quaker family in Morrisville, Pennsylvania, Kirkbride was a descendant of Joseph Kirkbride of the parish of Kirkbride, Cumberland, England. He began a study of medicine in 1828 under Dr. Nicholas Belleville, of Trenton, New Jersey when he was eighteen. After receiving a medical degree from the University of Pennsylvania in 1832, Kirkbride had his own practice from 1835 to 1840.

Psychiatry

In 1840 Kirkbride became superintendent of the Pennsylvania Hospital for the Insane. In 1844, Kirkbride helped to found AMSAII, becoming president from 1862 to 1870. Kirkbride pioneered what would be known as the Kirkbride Plan, to improve medical care for the insane, as a standardization for buildings that housed the patients.

Kirkbride's influential work, On the Construction, Organization, and General Arrangements of Hospitals for the Insane with Some Remarks on Insanity and Its Treatment, was published in 1854, and again in 1880. Kirkbride had been influenced by the Quaker-founded York Retreat in England whose leader, Samuel Tuke, had published an account entitled, Practical Hints on the Construction and Economy of Pauper Lunatic Asylums (York, England, 1815). The Tuke family had instituted in their hospital a "moral treatment" approach to care for patients, which centered upon humane and kindly behavior. The Superintendents’ Association made efforts to institute this approach in their hospitals.

Kirkbride's ideas brought about mixed feelings in both patients and peers. Some in the medical community saw his theories and ideas as stubbornly clinging to ideals that hindered medical progress, while others supported his ideas, and saw them change the treatment philosophy for the mentally insane. In his patients, he sometimes inspired fear and anger, even to the point that one attempted to murder him, but he also believed that the mentally ill could be treated, and possibly cured, and in fact Kirkbride, after the death of his first wife, married a former patient.

Kirkbride died of pneumonia on December 16, 1883 at his home at the Pennsylvania Hospital for the Insane.

Kirkbride architecture

Kirkbride was an advocate of building hospitals for the mentally ill in a style which he believed promoted recovery and healing. This style was used on many late 19th century hospitals, including St. Elizabeths Hospital in Washington, D.C. Many of these buildings, designed by leading architects of the time, are in ruins or decay. An estate, now known as "The Village", previously Traverse City State Hospital, was saved from destruction and beautifully restored.

Personal life

Kirkbride was married to Ann West Jenks in 1839. Together, they had two children - Ann, born in 1840, and Joseph John, born in 1842.

External links

• Thomas Story Kirkbride (1854) On the Construction, Organization, and General Arrangements of Hospitals for the Insane, Lindsay & Blakiston, Philadelphia (Google eBook)
• Kirkbrides and their histories
• Kirkbride Plan Hospitals at Architecture of the State
• PhillyHistory.org: Article and Historic Photographs of the Institute,
• Media related to at Wikimedia Commons