Neurology & Psychiatry: Two centuries

Two Centuries of Neurology and Psychiatry in the Journal

Allan H. Ropper, M.D.

N Engl J Med 2012; 367:58-65July 5, 2012

 Comments open through December 31, 2012

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Neurology, 1812–2012.

Fifty years ago, when the curator of the Boston Medical Library, Henry Viets, collated a score of the most important articles that had been published in the first century and a half of the New England Journal of Medicine, 10 of the 20 related to neurologic conditions.1 On the occasion of its 200th anniversary, one might ask why so many articles on neurologic and psychiatric diseases have been published in theJournal and what impact these pieces have had on their respective fields. Although the Journal is replete with reports of neurologic conditions that have entered the canon of medicine, it has been the large number and the breadth of clinical trials that have redefined neurology and psychiatry as active, therapeutic specialties. This article reviews the evolution of our understanding of neurologic and psychiatric conditions during the past two centuries./.../