The Introduction of Pavlovian Theory and the Change of the Medical System in China in the 1950s: Focusing on the Construction of the Protective Medical System
10.13081/kjmh.2020.29.613
- Author:
Yon Sil YU
1
Author Information
1. Assistant Professor, Department of History, Mokpo National University
- Publication Type:Featured Article
- From:Korean Journal of Medical History
2020;29(2):613-372
- CountryRepublic of Korea
- Language:Korean
-
Abstract:
In the 1930s, Stalin established Pavlovian theory as a socialist medical theory, criticized bourgeois science and ideology, and consolidated his dictatorship. Stalin used Pavlov's theory to emphasize the interaction between man and environment and the inheritance of acquired characteristics, trying to ensure the legitimacy of the socialist system reform in politics and society. Therefore, if the Soviet scientists and doctors did not conform to Pavlov's theory, their research would be strictly controlled, making free and creative research impossible. In the 1950s, China and North Korea, which accepted the socialist political model of the Soviet Union, also had this dogmatic tendency.
In 1950, China signed the “The Sino-Soviet Treaty of Friendship,” initiated the movement of learning from the Soviet Union in politics, economy, society, education, law, science, medical care, and other aspects, and established a socialist country based on the Soviet model. In Chinese medical circles, through the “Pavlov Learning Movement," they accepted the health care system and medical technology of the Soviet Union without any criticism, and carried out the ideological transformation of intellectuals to wipe out the influence of western capitalism. Moreover, Virchow's ‘Cellular Pathology’ and Mendel's ‘Genetics’ were denounced as reactionary bourgeoisie theory, and Pavlov's theory became a socialist medical theory based on dialectical materialism. As a result, the Communist Party of China reorganized the medical and scientific knowledge system based on Pavlov's theory, and took it as an important ideological tool to establish the socialist medical system.
In the 1950s, Chinese medical workers strengthened ideological education through the “Pavlov's learning movement,” applied this theory to clinical practice, and implemented new treatment methods such as “Sleep Therapy” and “PPM(Psychoprophylactic Painless childbirth Method).” In addition, hospitals implemented the “Protective Medical System” and established the socialist medical system. The goal of the protective medical system was to eliminate the negative stimulation which has adverse effects on the treatment of patients and to establish a patient-centered medical system. Therefore, the hospital launched a comprehensive effort to create a clean environment, eliminate all kinds of noise, cultivate a friendly working attitude, and improve nutrition. As a result, the hospital environment and the working attitude of medical staff improved and the treatment rate of diseases also improved, while the mortality rate of patients decreased.
At the same time, with the strengthening of political education for doctors, nurses and patients in hospitals, hospitals have become places to educate socialist laws and ideology. In addition, in order to prove the superiority of Pavlov's theory, medical workers carried out unscientific sleep therapy on patients, so people's body became an experimental space for of socialism. Moreover, in the implementation of PPM, women could not tell the pain of childbirth, but under medical control, they were in a contradictory situation of enduring labor pain. The Communist Party of China has established its national identity by promoting its image of “rescuer”, which liberates the patients from the pain of disease, and the “welfare” image of taking good care of the people's body. The Communist Party of China has reconstructed the metaphors of “sickness” and “labor pain”, making it an indispensable medium for the concepts of socialism, women's Liberation and medical welfare to be engraved on the people's body. Therefore, through the clinical practice of sleep therapy and PPM, we can understand how the Communist Party of China controlled the people's body, and such policies and systems demonstrate the “medical” governance mode of socialist control over the people.
