Historical Insights of Psychosomatic Medicine in Heidelberg

Abstract

At Heidelberg, psychotherapy and psychosomatic medicine established themselves earlier than elsewhere. As early as 1929 Viktor von Weizsäcker (1886–1957) succeeded in setting up a ward for neurotics at the Medical Clinic, thus taking a step toward psychosomatics in the midst of a place that was a mecca of the internal medicine of the time. This ward for neurotics in the later Krehl-Clinic was carried on into the years of war till 1943. In the post-war period three important institutions of psychosomatics came into being:

• 1. the Department of General Clinical Medicine, which started operating in November 1945, with Weizsäcker as the director and its emphasis on internal psychosomatics;

• 2. the Institute of Psychotherapy, which, founded in 1949 and initially integrated in Weizsäckers department, became independent after Weizsäcker’s retirement and was renamed ‘Psychosomatic Clinic’ in 1954;

• 3. The Society for Educational Help, which founded in 1949, advocated psychoanalysis in children and completed, for the time being, the ensemble of psychotherapeutic institutions at Heidelberg.