Fritz Held (medic)

Fritz Held (born May 25, 1920 in Sindelfingen , Württemberg ; † July 1, 1992 in Stuttgart ) was a German child psychiatrist and neurologist . He is considered to be the founder of the Kennedy Method , a therapy for treating partial performance disorders .

Life

Fritz Held was the son of a graduate farmer and attended secondary school in Stuttgart from 1930 to 1938 , where he also passed his Abitur. After his labor service , he joined the Cavalry Regiment 18 in Cannstatt , to which he belonged from mobilization in the subsequent reconnaissance departments until the end of the Second World War . His medical studies at the Eberhard-Karls University in Tübingen were interrupted due to the war. Towards the end of the war in former Czechoslovakia, Held was taken prisoner by the Soviets, from which he was released in autumn 1945.

He then continued his medical studies in Tübingen and passed the state examination in 1947 . After obtaining his license to practice medicine, he first worked at the University Psychiatric Clinic. In 1949 he moved to the Württemberg sanatorium in Schussenried. He left this in 1950 and worked as a specialist at the Institute for Child and Adolescent Psychiatry in Stuttgart. In the same year his dissertation for Dr. med. at the University of Tübingen on the subject of " Buddha's teaching as psychology".

From the 1960s onwards, Held carried out research on dyslexia in children. He published his first specialist publication “Youth Psychiatric Studies” in 1966. The writings “Dyslexia and arithmetic weakness”, “Dyslexia primer for parents, teachers and doctors” (1975) and “The school-difficult child. Causes and Misdiagnoses ”form the basis of the Kennedy Method .

In addition to his work as a doctor, he worked in poetry . Held published a collection of poems in 1958.

Fritz Held was married twice and had four children. He died in Stuttgart in 1992 as a result of cancer.

Scientific work

Held assumes that the weaknesses in reading and writing and arithmetic are mainly biological causes. His method tries a playful approach to convey the basic elements of reading-writing and arithmetic. The starting point of curative education therapy is the intensive daily imprinting of letters and numbers or quantities. His approach is based on the knowledge that the individual letters and the numbers or quantities are stored in different areas of the brain. Letter and number do not belong to the same perception area and are processed separately from one another. Held assumes that the brain can only solve a variety of tasks by specializing certain areas of the brain for certain functions, since only division of tasks enables maximum performance.

The functions of reading-writing are independent and have nothing to do with the function of speaking. According to Held, people with dyslexia often have a large vocabulary and are good at expressing themselves. The read-write center is located with the language center in one half of the brain, with a right-handed person in the left half and with a left-handed person in the right. The left-hand read-write center forms a functional unit with the right hand and the right-hand read-write center forms a functional unit with the left. In the case of left-handers who have been forced to write with their right hand, this circuit is significantly blocked and thus the read-write center is hindered in its function in the sense of dyslexia. The biological immaturity of the areas responsible for reading, writing and arithmetic can lead to functional disorders.

Publications (selection)

• Buddha's teaching as psychology , (dissertation) 1950
• Poems . Publisher: Der Karlsruher Bote, 1958
• Adolescent Psychiatric Studies. From theory and practice for doctors, psychologists, educators, lawyers, social workers, home educators and other social professions . Luchterhand Verlag 1966.
• Dyslexia and dyslexia. In: Ärztliche Praxis , 30/1974, 1974
• The difficult school child. Causes and misdiagnosis; Criticism of the one-sided depth psychological interpretation of symptoms; Dyslexia, poor numeracy and the problem of didactogenic learning disorders; therapeutic aspects . Lehmann Verlag, Munich 1975, ISBN 978-3-469-00547-2
• Dyslexia Primer for Doctors. Development, recognition and treatment of the reading and writing difficulties of the child . Institute for Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Stuttgart 1975

Individual evidence

1. ^ Lutz Hagestedt: The German Literature Lexicon. The 20th century records authors who write in the German language and whose significant work lies in the 20th century. Ed .: Walter de Gruyter. tape 16 , 2011, p. 319 .
2. ^ Lutz Hagestedt: The German Literature Lexicon. Ed .: Walter de Gruyter. 2011, p. 319 .
3. ^ Fritz Held: Buddha's teaching as psychology . Ed .: Maschinenschr. 1st edition. 1951.
4. ^ Fritz Held: Adolescent psychiatric studies: from theory and practice for doctors, psychologists, pedagogues, lawyers, social workers, home educators and other social professions . Ed .: Luchterhand. Youth in focus, 1966, p. 131 .
5. ^ Lutz Hagestedt: The German Literature Lexicon. The 20th century records authors who write in the German language and whose significant work lies in the 20th century. Ed .: Walter de Gruyter. 2011, p. 319 .
6. ↑ Fritz Held: Brain physiological aspects of the read-write function . Ed .: The pediatrician. 1978.