This is one of five films made of the Spa at Harrogate and its treatments in 1931.  This particular film was made by A R Baines.  The series of films made in 1931 were undoubtedly made to promote the baths at a time when income was sharply declining following the Great Crash of 1929 – see the Context for Spa Treatment Harrogate Pump Room (1939), was made C.R.H. Pickard. Electrotherapy of one kind or another has a long history, going back to ancient times with the use of the electricity...

This is one of five films made of the Spa at Harrogate and its treatments in 1931.  This particular film was made by A R Baines.  The series of films made in 1931 were undoubtedly made to promote the baths at a time when income was sharply declining following the Great Crash of 1929 – see the Context for Spa Treatment Harrogate Pump Room (1939), was made C.R.H. Pickard.

Electrotherapy of one kind or another has a long history, going back to ancient times with the use of the electricity producing torpedo fish.  In modern times, the first recorded observation of the use of electricity specifically for medical purposes in Europe was attributed to Kratzenstein, professor of medicine at Halle in 1744.  Yet it was the Italian Luigi Galvani who became most associated with applying electricity (direct current) to animal bodies (falsely believing the electricity to originate in muscles).   His experiments were taken up by his younger contemporary Allesandro Volta, and went on to become popular public exhibitions after Giovanni Aldini applied galvanic electricity to the corpse of the murderer Thomas Forster in London in 1803.  This was also the year that Joseph Carpue published his treatise, An Introduction to Electricity and Galvanism, with Cases showing their Effects in the Cure of Disease.

It might be said that the use of electricity on human bodies moved from the lecture theatre to medical treatments at first through its use in spas before being taken up by established medicine in hospitals.  In fact electro-therapy has been very much on the fringe of orthodox medicine, principally in relation to the neurology of the brain, as in ECT, or more recently in the relief of pain.  Hence you would be unlikely to find many, if any, of the practices seen in this film in a public hospitals – as voluntary hospitals gradually became available to all during the 19th century (electrotherapy hardly makes an appearance in either Porter or Hardy, References).  This may not be surprising given that the boundary in spas between medicine and leisure was very blurred.  As the scientisation of medicine progressed from the 18th century through to the 20th, reflected in its classification and language, so the gap between the ‘subjective’ and the ‘objective’ became ever larger – a process analysed by Michel Foucault (References).  And of course the poor got only the most rudimentary treatment, and even then often dependent on private insurance (through friendly societies and similar).

The marginalisation of the procedures on display in this film helps explain why it is difficult to find much information on them.  In general they might be classed under the rubric of ‘alternative medicine’; although you will be hard put to find anything on them in books on alternative, or complementary, medicine today.  The ingenious treatments shown in the film seem to have been made up by their practitioners as they went along.  They all tend to revolve around the use of electricity in in some form, whether as heat, light or for creating water currents.  A galvanic bath uses the components of water and gentle electrical current. The recipient lies in a 34c degree bath, and electricity is then passed through the body.  Galvanic baths are mostly used in the treatment of degenerative diseases such as inflammatory arthritis and problems with the joints. The treatment lasts about 15 minutes.  One pioneer of their use was Dr Jennie Trout from Canada, who became the very first woman legally to become a medical doctor.  Trout opened her practice Toronto in 1875, growing to six houses adjoining the family residence accommodating some sixty patients.

The Faradic stimulation of muscles – named after Michael Faraday whose work paved the way for the later discovery of alternating current – was used  for obesity, insomnia and muscular and nervous afflictions.   It was named ‘Bergonie Treatment’ after  Professor J. Bergonie of Bordeaux who, in 1911, constructed an instrument by which powerful rhythmic contractions of human muscles can be induced electrically, by interrupting the current 30 times per second, with a minimum of unpleasant sensations (see Krogh and Lindhard).  Both terms are still in use, sometimes in relation to contraptions that purport to help eradicate unwanted body fat.

The Leucodescent (therapeutic) Lamp, developed in 1906, was heavily promoted by its makers, the Spear-Marshall Company, based in Chicago.  Although used in this context to produce a local radiant heat, it was also used in mental hospitals to treat severely agitated patients, with great claims made for its success.  The idea of using light (as well as colours, sounds and smells) as a means of inducing calm and relaxation has continued to have a long life.

The Schnee Four Cell was a type of galvanic bath used for treating general rheumatic conditions and painful joints.   The Sacred Medical Order describe it thus: “a patient would be seated with an individual bath for each limb. Each bath had its own current, which could be varied independently.  In this treatment patients could bear a much stronger current than with electrodes on small areas, because of the large skin area exposed to the current in each bath. There was no danger of electric shock as in a full bath as the porcelain tubs were not connected to water pipes and were well insulated from earthing . . .  It also allowed the person to be treated without undressing, speeding up treatment times and proving much more comfortable and convenient than a full body bath.”

Diathermy simply means electrically induced heat (literally ‘through heating’), and is used here for muscle relaxation – it still is used in physiotherapy .   Today the term is most often used in relation to electrosurgery, though loop diathermy is used as a way of removing abnormal cells from the cervix.

Electrotherapy remains a significant form of therapy, although how much of this is evidence based is moot.   It has gained a renewed popularity  with greater understanding of how it works: how different nerve fibres respond to different frequencies and amplitudes, thus allowing for the selective production of various monoamines, amino acids and peptides in the central nervous system.  There are also many new applications – for a full list see Electrotherapy on the Web (References).   But if this film has anything to teach us, it is that some claims need to be taken with a pinch of salt.

References

Jean Barclay, In Good Hands: The History of the Chartered Society of Physiotherapy 1894-1994, Butterworth-Heinemann, 1994.
Michel Foucault, The birth of the clinic: an archaeology of medical perception, Routledge, 1989.
Anne Hardy, Health and Medicine in Britain since 1860, Palgrave, 2001.
Malcolm G. Neesam, Exclusively Harrogate,  Dalesman Publishing. 1989.
Roy Porter, The Greatest Benefit to Mankind: A Medical History of Humanity, Fontana Press, 1999.
Tim Watson (editor), Electrotherapy: Evidence-Based Practice, 12th edition, Elsevier, 2008.
The Unnetie Project , Storylines, Harrogate Spa
A. Krogh and J. Lindhard, A Comparison between Voluntary and Electrically Induced Muscular Work in Man.
Gary L. Lisman, Arlene Parr, Bittersweet Memories: A History of the Peoria State Hospital.
Galvanic Baths
Electrotherapy on the Web