Torsten Sjögren

Karl Gustaf Torsten Sjögren ( [ ˌ ʃø gɾɛn ], also [ ˌ xØ gɾɛn ]; born January 30, 1896 in Södertälje, † 27 July 1974 in Gothenburg ) was a Swedish psychiatrist and geneticist. He is considered a pioneer of Swedish psychiatry. After he was named (along with Larsson days ) Sjögren -Larsson syndrome, which is a form of mental retardation in combination with a progressive spastic paraplegia and ichthyosis endemic almost exclusively occurs in Sweden. It is criticized especially his role in the dissemination of National Socialist ideas in the form of racial theory and eugenics.

Biography

Sjogren was born in 1896 as son of Vilhelm Sjögren and his wife Ingeborg, born Gustafsson, in Södertälje. He put 1914 in Stockholm, the High School and adopted in the same year at Stockholm University to study medicine on. He completed his studies in 1918 and was approved in 1925 with the acquisition of the licentiate. Also in 1925 he married Yvonne Petre (* 1892), daughter of Torsten Petre and his wife Jeanne, born Fonzes Lafoux. 1925 to 1926 he was employed as a medical assistant at the Neurological Clinic in Stockholm. In 1926, he worked as an assistant doctor at the State Institute for Racial Biology in Uppsala. In 1927 he got a job as a hospital doctor at the University Hospital in Lund. In 1931 he became chief physician there. At the University of Lund, he received his doctorate in 1931, both in medicine and in psychiatry. From 1932 to 1935 he was chief physician and medical director of the Mental Health Institute in Lillhagen north of Gothenburg and from 1935 to 1945 chief physician of the psychiatric ward of the hospital " Sahlgrenska Sjukhuset " in Gothenburg, in whose structure he had a decisive role. In 1945 he was finally appointed to the Chair of Psychiatry at the Karolinska Institute, a position he held until his retirement in 1961. At the same time he was chief physician at the local Karolinska University Hospital. Sjogren was, until his death in second marriage with Göta Petersson ( born 1919 ), daughter of Birger Petersson and his wife Nelly, born Johansson, married.

Memberships

Sjogren was close to the Nazi racial theory and represented Sweden in the International Federation of Eugenic Organizations ( IFEO ), whose member he was since 1933. From 1936 to 1948 he was faced with the organization as president. In 1935, he joined the International Human Heredity Committee and remained a member until 1949. In 1946 he became a member of the Scientific Council of the Swedish Medical Association ( se: Medicinalstyrelsen ) and 1951 elected a member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences.

Reference

The psychiatrist Torsten Sjögren is not to be confused with the ophthalmologist Henrik Sjögren, after the similar sounding Sjögren's syndrome is named.