Andrea Verga

Andrea Verga (20 May 1811 – 21 November 1895) was an Italian psychiatrist and neurologist. Verga is remembered for his pioneer work done in the study of the criminally insane, as well as his early research of acrophobia, a condition he personally suffered from.

Biography

Early life and education Andrea Verga was born in Treviglio (Bergamo) on 30 May 1811, to a modest family. He was the second son of Domitilla Carcano and Giosuè Verga, who worked as a conveyor from Treviglio to Milan. As a child, he did not attend elementary school, but due to his mother's religious interest, he was initiated into ecclesiastical studies in the seminary. Consequently, he enrolled at the medical faculty of the University of Pavia, in November 1830. During the earliest years, he was attracted to lessons of the anatomy teacher Bartolomeo Panizza, of whom in 1836, after graduation, he became an assistant. In the same period, he participated with Giulio Carcano, Cesare Correnti, and other young patriots in the "Strenna Il Presagio", in which he published the short story La Fatua (1836). The love for poetry, the clear and flowing style, and the taste for the curious were characteristic traits of Verga. These stylistic features are remarkable also in his scientific writings, making him fully part of the Italian tradition of medical-literati. The years of assistantship in Pavia (1836–1842) were fundamental for him. Assisting Panizza deepened his knowledge about the study of human and pathological anatomy, physiology, comparative anatomy and experimental practice, devoting himself to the study of the nervous system. At the age of twenty-six, he went on an educational trip to German-speaking countries. He was also interested in Panizza's study of comparative anatomy, therefore between 1839 and 1841 he spent long periods of time in Comacchio, studying the reproduction of eels.

At the beginning of Andrea Verga’s professional career In 1842, he moved to Milan, where he found employment in the private asylum Villa Antonini (hospice of San Celso), of which in 1847 he was promoted to "assistant director", then beginning his study of mental alienation. He also undertook the practice of general medicine, surgery, and anatomical exercises at the Ospedale Maggiore, collaborating with the new medical journal of Milan, founded by his friend Agostino Bertani and directed by Panizza. He participated in the congresses of Italian scientists. During the 1844 Milan convention, he participated in the Natural and civil news on the Lombardy of Carlo Cattaneo (whose second volume never came out). He wrote his beliefs about the Stabilimenti Pei Pazzi, a matter he previously discussed in the Gazzetta Medica of Milan with the title of Historical notes on the establishments of the madmen in Lombardy. While adhering to the ideals of the "Risorgimento", he did not take part in the Five Days of 1848 in the newly liberated Milan but was still appointed director of the public asylum of the Senavra by the provisional government. In 1849–1850, following the closure of the University of Pavia, he taught human anatomy in the newly created school of medicine, surgery, and pharmacy in the Ospedale Maggiore. In the following summer of 1850, he was sent by the same hospital to visit asylums in Switzerland and other European countries to study their organization and evaluate a reform of the Senavra. His experience as an asylum director convinced him more and more of the need to reorganize Italian asylums, transforming them into real tools for the treatment of insanity and into research and teaching centers for the nascent psychiatry, which still did not find space in universities.

In 1864, Verga then transformed the psychiatric appendix into an independent journal, the Italian Archive for nervous diseases and more particularly for mental insanities, directing it together with friends and colleagues Cesare Castiglioni and Serafino Biffi.

Last years of Andrea Verga’s life In the last years of his life, he studied the physiology of old age and in 1895 founded a Relief Fund for poor alienists and their families. Andrea Verga died in Milan on 21 November 1895. Leonardo Bianchi, Serafino Biffi, Alexandre Brierre de Boismont, Gabriele Buccola, Carlo Cantoni, Filippo De Filippi, Camillo Golgi, Carlo Livi, Cesare Lombroso, Paolo Mantegazza, Scipion Pinel, Augusto Tamburini, Augusto Tebaldi, Tito Vignoli. There are also numerous intellectuals, writers and politicians, including Vittoria Aganoor, Raffaello Barber, Luigi Bodio, Cesare Cantù, Giulio Carcano, Cesare Correnti, Andrea Maffei, Tullo Massarani. The archive also includes a substantial core consisting of medical and scientific writings: notes, observations, manuscripts, drafts and other printed material, which testify the path of studies, the period of the assistantship at the chair of anatomy of the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Pavia and the subsequent career of the alienist as a doctor and psychiatrist.

The role of Verga in criminal asylum Andrea Verga was one of the main character of the important discussion held in Aversa, 1877, where were listed the main questions for the past and present psychiatry.

There is a need for a criminal asylum in Italy? At the time the answer was "yes" but of course today it would be "no". Is an happier denomination feasible? At the congress of Anversa was proposed the name "Health and safety asylum" but was than called "Manicomio Giudiziario" . Only in 1975 we arrived to the name O.P.G. ("Ospedale Psichiatrico Giudiziario"). What was the correct number of criminal asylum present in the territory? There wasn't a correct number but going on with time the number of asylum and beds in it started increasing rapidly. What are the moral and material conditions of criminal asylum? This one was the question whose answer remained very vague: they knew the aim but not how to achieve it respecting morality. What are the procedures for admission and discharge of patients from asylums? In Anversa was decided that the exit from the criminal asylum will be taken place on the basis of a judicial decision based on a medical advice.