James Esdaile (1808-1859) and India connection with HYPNOSIS

While James Braid was making quantum leaps with hypnosis, another Scottish doctor, James Esdaile, was experimenting and gaining permanent recognition in the history of hypnosis. Stationed in Hoogly, India, Esdaile used hypnosis in surgery with astounding results; and even today many would say that his work with applied hypnosis almost borders on the fantastic.

Esdaile submitted reports at the end of 1846 indicating that he had performed several thousand minor operations and about 300 major ones, including 19 amputations, all painlessly. Due mostly to the removal of post-operative shock through hypnosis, he cut the 50% mortality rate of that time down to less than 8%! (One book even reported less than 5%.) The Medical Association actually accepted his report, and he was assigned to the Calcutta hospital to continue "mesmeristic" operations.



While the Association considered mesmerism taboo at the University Hospital, mesmerism could quite easily be expected to work for the uneducated masses in India. They were right, of course. In India, long known as the home of occult sciences, Esdaile was assured of success from the very beginning because of the common belief system. Later, when Esdaile returned home, he was unable to duplicate his work because of lack of belief and negative expectation; so his career went down the same dark path of discouragement take by Elliotson.