Von konditionierten Ratten und gestressten Werktätigen: Rudolf Baumann und der Stress- und Umweltdiskurs in der DDR [On conditioned rats and stressed workmen: Rudolf Baumann and the discourse about stress and environment in the GDR]

Item Type:	Article
Title:	Von konditionierten Ratten und gestressten Werktätigen: Rudolf Baumann und der Stress- und Umweltdiskurs in der DDR [On conditioned rats and stressed workmen: Rudolf Baumann and the discourse about stress and environment in the GDR]
Creators Name:	Gausemeier, B.
Abstract:	The emergence of cardiovascular diseases from stress, i.e. psychosocial pressure, was a constitutive element in the international medical discourse of the 1960s and 1970s. This article describes an East German variant of the stress discourse, developed by Rudolf Baumann and his associates at the Institute for cortico-visceral pathology and therapy in Berlin-Buch. The group sought to develop a genuinely materialist approach to the problem of psychosocially caused diseases, as well as ways of therapy and prevention suited to a socialist health system. At the same time, it was constantly drawing on Western concepts and practices. By examining this project in international context, congruences and differences between Eastern and Western perceptions of the stressful effects of industrial society are worked out. Furthermore, the article discusses that the concept of stress implied ambitious programs for social prevention and therapy, the realization of which in both political systems was constrained by the social reality.
Keywords:	Stress, Hypertension, Health System of the GDR, Prevention, Psychosomatic Medicine, Neurophysiology
Source:	NTM Zeitschrift für Geschichte der Wissenschaften, Technik und Medizin
ISSN:	0036-6978
Publisher:	Springer
Volume:	27
Number:	3
Page Range:	311-341
Date:	September 2019
Official Publication:	https://doi.org/10.1007/s00048-019-00219-6
PubMed:	View item in PubMed

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