David Skae

David Skae MD, FRCSEd (5 July 1814 – 18 April 1873) was a Scottish physician specialising in psychological medicine. He has been described as the founder of the Edinburgh School of Psychiatry and several of his assistants and pupils went on to become leading psychiatrists throughout the British Isles.

Life David Skae was born at 5 Elder Street in Edinburgh the son of David Skae, an architect and builder, and his wife, Helen Lothian. Both parents died whilst David was a child. He was educated by his maternal uncle, the Rev. William Lothian, at St Andrews.

Works Skae published papers on 'The Treatment of Dipsomaniacs' in 1858, and on 'The Legal Relations of Insanity' (1861 and 1867). His major work was the 'Classification of the Various Forms of Insanity on a Rational and Practical Basis.' He made this topic the subject of an address which he delivered at the Royal College of Physicians, London, on the occasion of his occupying the presidential chair of the Association of Medical Officers of Asylums (9 July 1863); and he further developed it in the Morisonian lectures on insanity, 1873. These lectures were completed and published posthumously by his pupil and successor, Thomas Smith Clouston. Skae's classification is founded upon what he called the 'Natural History of Insanity.' Instead of separating the insane into groups of maniacs, melancholiacs, and so on, Skae proposed that classification should be based on the underlying bodily condition of the patient—puerperal mania, traumatic mania, and so on. Skae's classification was not generally adopted. His definition of insanity was "a disease of the brain affecting the mind".