Lessons from the insulin story in psychiatry.

For nearly 20 years, from the mid-1930s until the mid-1950s, early cases of schizophrenia were treated, and surprisingly successfully treated, by deep insulin coma therapy. This paper is an attempt to explore what, if any, lessons there are to be gained for us 30 years later from a treatment regime that turned out to have nothing to do with insulin per se. Such lessons as there may be from our recent historical past may help us to foster our critical acumen and commonsense as we try in our daily practice to understand how we can best help our patients in safety.