Manfred Sakel

Manfred Joshua Sakel (1900-1957) was an Austrian (later Austrian-American) neurophysiologist and psychiatrist, credited with developing insulin shock therapy in 1927. Sakel was born on June 6, 1900, in Nadwórna, in the former Austria-Hungary Empire (now Ukraine). Sakel studied Medicine at the University of Vienna from 1919 to 1925, specializing in neurology and neuropsychiatry. In 1933 he became a researcher at the University of Vienna's Neuropsy... more

Manfred Joshua Sakel (1900-1957) was an Austrian (later Austrian-American) neurophysiologist and psychiatrist, credited with developing insulin shock therapy in 1927. Sakel was born on June 6, 1900, in Nadwórna, in the former Austria-Hungary Empire (now Ukraine). Sakel studied Medicine at the University of Vienna from 1919 to 1925, specializing in neurology and neuropsychiatry. In 1933 he became a researcher at the University of Vienna's Neuropsychiatric Clinic, but was forced to immigrate to the United States in 1936, when the National Socialist Party came to power in Austria. In the USA, he became an attending physician and researcher at the Harlem Valley State Hospital. Dr. Sakel was the developer of insulin shock therapy in 1927 while a young doctor in Vienna, that would become widely used on individuals with schizophrenia and other mental patients. He noted that insulin-induced coma and convulsions, due to the low level of glucose attained in the blood (hypoglycemic crisis), had... less