Gilbert Ballet (March 29, 1853 – March 17, 1916) was a French

psychiatrist A psychiatrist is a physician who specializes in psychiatry, the branch of medicine devoted to the diagnosis, prevention, study, and treatment of mental disorders. Psychiatrists are physicians and evaluate patients to determine whether their ...

neurologist Neurology (from el, νεῦρον (neûron), "string, nerve" and the suffix -logia, "study of") is the branch of medicine dealing with the diagnosis and treatment of all categories of conditions and disease involving the brain, the spinal ...

and

historian A historian is a person who studies and writes about the past and is regarded as an authority on it. Historians are concerned with the continuous, methodical narrative and research of past events as relating to the human race; as well as the st ...

who was a native of

Ambazac Ambazac (; oc, Embasac) is a commune in the Haute-Vienne department in the Nouvelle-Aquitaine region in western France. Population Personalities * Maurice Boitel, painter artist, he painted in Ambazac between 1947 et 1996 * Raymond Desè ...

in the department of

Haute-Vienne Haute-Vienne (; oc, Nauta Vinhana, ; English: Upper Vienne) is a department in the Nouvelle-Aquitaine region in southwest-central France. Named after the Vienne River, it is one of the twelve departments that together constitute Nouvelle-Aquita ...

. He studied medicine in

Limoges Limoges (, , ; oc, Lemòtges, locally ) is a city and Communes of France, commune, and the prefecture of the Haute-Vienne Departments of France, department in west-central France. It was the administrative capital of the former Limousin region ...

and

Paris Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. ...

, and subsequently became ''Chef de clinique'' under

Jean-Martin Charcot Jean-Martin Charcot (; 29 November 1825 – 16 August 1893) was a French neurologist and professor of anatomical pathology. He worked on hypnosis and hysteria, in particular with his hysteria patient Louise Augustine Gleizes. Charcot is known a ...

(1825–1893) at the Salpêtrière. In 1900 he became a professor of psychiatry, and in 1904 established the department of psychiatry at

Hôtel-Dieu de Paris In French-speaking countries, a hôtel-Dieu ( en, hostel of God) was originally a hospital for the poor and needy, run by the Catholic Church. Nowadays these buildings or institutions have either kept their function as a hospital, the one in Paris b ...

. In 1909 he succeeded

Alix Joffroy Alix Joffroy (16 December 1844, in Stainville – 24 November 1908) was a French neurologist and psychiatrist remembered for describing Joffroy's sign. He studied in Paris, earning his doctorate in 1873, becoming médecin des hôpitaux in ...

as chair of clinical psychiatry and brain disorders at the Hôpital Sainte-Anne. In 1909 Ballet was elected president of the ''Société française d'histoire de la médecine'', and in 1912 became a member of the

Académie des sciences The French Academy of Sciences (French: ''Académie des sciences'') is a learned society, founded in 1666 by Louis XIV at the suggestion of Jean-Baptiste Colbert, to encourage and protect the spirit of French scientific research. It was at the ...

. Ballet is remembered for his 1903 publication of
Traité de pathologie mentale
', which remained a principal reference book on psychiatry for nearly fifty years in France. In 1911 Ballet described a disorder he called ''psychose hallucinatoire chronique'', being defined as chronic

delirium Delirium (also known as acute confusional state) is an organically caused decline from a previous baseline of mental function that develops over a short period of time, typically hours to days. Delirium is a syndrome encompassing disturbances ...

that consists primarily of

hallucination A hallucination is a perception in the absence of an external stimulus that has the qualities of a real perception. Hallucinations are vivid, substantial, and are perceived to be located in external objective space. Hallucination is a combinati ...

s. In French psychiatry, " chronic hallucinatory psychosis" was to become classified as a distinct entity, separate from other self-delusional disorders. Among his other works were a 1888 publication on

inner speech Intrapersonal communication is the process by which an individual communicates within themselves, acting as both sender and receiver of messages, and encompasses the use of unspoken words to consciously engage in self-talk and inner speech. Intr ...

aphasia Aphasia is an inability to comprehend or formulate language because of damage to specific brain regions. The major causes are stroke and head trauma; prevalence is hard to determine but aphasia due to stroke is estimated to be 0.1–0.4% in t ...

, ''Le Langage Interieur et les Diverses Formes de l'Aphasie'', an 1897 treatise on

hypochondria Hypochondriasis or hypochondria is a condition in which a person is excessively and unduly worried about having a serious illness. An old concept, the meaning of hypochondria has repeatedly changed. It has been claimed that this debilitating cond ...

and

paranoia Paranoia is an instinct or thought process that is believed to be heavily influenced by anxiety or fear, often to the point of delusion and irrationality. Paranoid thinking typically includes persecutory beliefs, or beliefs of conspiracy conce ...

titled ''Psychoses et affections nerveuses'', and an historical

biography A biography, or simply bio, is a detailed description of a person's life. It involves more than just the basic facts like education, work, relationships, and death; it portrays a person's experience of these life events. Unlike a profile or c ...

on philosopher

Emanuel Swedenborg Emanuel Swedenborg (, ; born Emanuel Swedberg; 29 March 1772) was a Swedish pluralistic-Christian theologian, scientist, philosopher and mystic. He became best known for his book on the afterlife, ''Heaven and Hell'' (1758). Swedenborg had ...

("''Swedenborg; histoire d'un visionnaire aux XVIIIe siècle''"). With

Adrien Proust Adrien Achille Proust (18 March 1834 – 26 November 1903) was a French epidemiologist and hygienist. He was the father of novelist Marcel Proust and doctor Robert Proust. He studied medicine in Paris, where in 1862 he obtained his medical docto ...

, he published ''L'Hygiène du neurasthénique'', a book that was later translated into English and published as "The Treatment of Neurasthenia".

Associated eponym

* "Ballet's sign":

Palsy Palsy is a medical term which refers to various types of paralysisDan Agin, ''More Than Genes: What Science Can Tell Us About Toxic Chemicals, Development, and the Risk to Our Children;; (2009), p. 172. or paresis, often accompanied by weakness and ...

affecting one or more

extraocular muscles The extraocular muscles (extrinsic ocular muscles), are the seven extrinsic muscles of the human eye. Six of the extraocular muscles, the four recti muscles, and the superior and inferior oblique muscles, control movement of the eye and the ot ...

, commonly associated with

Graves' ophthalmopathy Graves’ ophthalmopathy, also known as thyroid eye disease (TED), is an autoimmune inflammatory disorder of the orbit and periorbital tissues, characterized by upper eyelid retraction, lid lag, swelling, redness ( erythema), conjunctivitis, an ...

References

* ''Parts of this article are based on a translation of an equivalent article at the

French Wikipedia The French Wikipedia (french: Wikipédia en français) is the French-language edition of Wikipedia, the free online encyclopedia. This edition was started on 23 March 2001, two months after the official creation of Wikipedia. It has article ...

''.
''Gilbert Ballet''
@

Who Named It ''Whonamedit?'' is an online English-language dictionary of medical eponyms and the people associated with their identification. Though it is a dictionary, many eponyms and persons are presented in extensive articles with comprehensive bibliograp ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Ballet, Gilbert French psychiatrists French neurologists 1853 births 1916 deaths People from Haute-Vienne Members of the French Academy of Sciences

Associated eponym

See also

References