[Waldheim--the difficult task of investigation]

This is a report on a mental hospital--or, rather, a department of a mental hospital--called "Waldheim", (literal meaning: "hostal, or home in the woods") which is a section of the mental hospital at Hochweitzschen in Saxony in the former German Democratic Republic (GDR). Public opinion had been aroused some time ago by an article published in the German weekly "Stern" in which it was stated that psychotic patients were being subjected to leukotomy or stereotactic surgery, and that castration by x-ray treatment was being performed in mentally handicapped women, in that hospital. The article prompted the then Ministery of Health of the GDR to constitute an "expert committee" to investigate into the matter. The magazine's allegations were partly confirmed by the committee. The GDR parliament then constituted a "special parliamentary commission" for another inquiry. Again several allegations were confirmed. It was stated that the events and actions in that hospital had been unsatisfactorily assessed and digested. The authors undertake to make the procedures followed by the medical and nursing staff, accessible to a wider public and to render them more lucid. Important structural characteristics of the patterns that developed there, were the governmentally prescribed segregation of severely diseased persons to "treat" them far away from their residential community, the absence of a critical general public, and the amalgamation of supervisory institutions with those that require to be supervised.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)