The Real Haunted Story Of La Castañeda Insane Asylum

The LA Costanza General asylum, the biggest mental health hospital in Mexico, gained notoriety for the terrible circumstances and cruel treatment its inmates endured. In their fury, relatives took their demand for immediate assistance to the highest echelons of government. Although it was Mexico's biggest mental health facility,

Porfirio Diaz's La Castaneda General Asylum was notorious for its inmates brutal treatment. And terrible living circumstances. As a result of their Fury, family members took their petition to the highest levels in order to have their immediate needs met.

There have been a number of initiatives in Mexico in recent years demanding more effective mental health services and treatment for the 15,000,000 individuals who are living with mental illness. But in bygone eras, mental institutions had a bad reputation for the way they treated their patients and the environment in which they operated. The general asylum of La Castaneda stood out among them.

Before La Castaneda was built, there were already 2 institutions that specifically dealt with mental disease built in the Plaza de San Fernando, in the heart of the city at the start of the colonial era, the San Hippolito Hospital. Also called the Plaza de Los Locos was the first mental hospital in America. El Divino Salvador was the name of the second sanatorium that was open only to women.

It was generally known as La Canoa. Due to its location on Canoa St. which is now Donseless near the intersection. Both structures served as barracks and military hospitals during the social and political upheavals of the 19th century. This is why those who needed medical attention were either transported to the presidio's or abandoned on the streets. General Porphyrio Diaz ascent to power coincided with the health care system's hopes for modernization.

The Manicomeo General project was so proposed in 1878, although it was not started by Diaz himself until 1910. 10. From that point on until the middle of the 20th century, it was Mexico's preeminent mental institution. It was constructed on property that belonged to a pulque Hacienda called La Castaneda, in the area that was formerly called Mixcoac. No stranger to the moniker, the Palace of Madness than this establishment, it held a diverse group of violent and mentally ill individuals.

Regardless of their age, race, religion or nationality, they were to be reintegrated into society when their disorders were treated. It's psychiatric clinics served as a teaching tool for medical students and the production of academic articles and other scholarly works encouraged introspection, organization, and communication inside the institution. Several groups of patients were assigned to various areas. Patients were admitted to different pavilions according to their condition.

The first class distinguished pavilion treated all patients equally. Observation pavilion housed the poor and 2nd and 3rd class pensioners. A section was set aside for addicts and the dangerous pavilion housed prisoners whose safety was questionable as well as violent and agitated individuals. Patients with contagious diseases, homosexuals, prostitutes and epileptic seizures were housed in separate wards from the imbeciles and patients with epilepsy.

La Castaneda's notoriety is derived on accounts of injustice and cruelty. The documents sent by individuals to the Secretariat de Salubridad Y Assistencia or the Secretaria de Gobernacion regarding bad practices, questionable treatment and abuse of its inmates, can be found in the presidential archives collection of the Archivo General de la Nacion.

Agn. Images from the Hermanos Mio collection, a group of journalists whose work is now part of the AGN S graphic collections, document the last and most recent accounts of the features of daily life in a building that, despite the many negative associations with it until its 1968. Was a turning point in Mexico's psychiatric practice.