One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest: A Brief Synopsys

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Recommended: Ethical issues for mental health

In the 1960’s Ken Kesey, a student of the university of Oregon and Stanford University, became interested in alternative medicine and mental health after participating in a US Military psychedelic drug study. Kesey proceed to work for this same institution. For him it was important to take notes on the individuals in this ward, to draw them even! Kesey had an urge to get to know them, even to understand their story and this is precisely what lead him to his current perspective on society and the conformity which it expects of those who are a part of it. It is in this spirit which he wrote one flew over the Cuckoo’s nest and made a brilliant example of counter culture which to this day stands as a strong criticism to the way which mental health professions can become so corrupt and out of control.
To give a bit of context to Kesey’s beliefs it is important to understand the institutionalized mental health system which was so prevalent in the 60’s. In these early years of the mental health profession, patients were often treated in large wards. It wasn’t only patients here however, others who were not “normal” would simply be grouped together for mass treatment. The problem here was that those who needed confinement, not just treatment were thrown in with these individuals (such as Mcmurphy) who ended up in the wards for reasons other than true disorder or dysfunction. Insulin shock therapy, Electro convulsive therapy, cold/hot baths, lobotomies and so many other unethical treatments with little or no empirical support for their efficacy were prevalent and used with little or no remorse. This lead to a huge uproar by the human rights community. Luckily many of these practices fell out of fashion as compassionate care began...

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...ts may also play a role in this inferiority complex.
Overall I feel that this patient-practitioner role reversal which Kesey strategically inserted into this plot holds a great value in terms of social commentary. The disorders of many of the patients were displayed accurately as well as Bromden’s Paranoid Schizophrenia, or Nurse Ratched’s Psychopathy, and added to the authenticity of the environment which Kesey created to develop his critique on social conformity. The only disorder which I feel was wrongly displayed would be Mcmurphy’s “psychopathy” as he does not seem to meet any of the criteria of one with antisocial personality disorder. In conclusion, this book has a great literary value in the context of genuine empathetic care and patient treatment in the 20th century. I would highly recommend this book to anyone looking to ponder the subject further.

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