Gerhard Klumbies

Gerhard Klumbies (born December 5, 1919 in Königsberg ; † January 19, 2015 in Jena ) was a German internist and psychotherapist who is considered a pioneer of psychosomatics in the GDR . He also lived as an emeritus at his decades-long workplace in Jena.

Live and act

Klumbies was born in 1919 as the son of a pastor in Königsberg in East Prussia . There he also spent his childhood and adolescence. He was a soldier “from the first to the last day” of the Second World War , but was given the opportunity to study human medicine at the same time . From 1940 he studied in his hometown of Königsberg, where he also heard lectures from Konrad Lorenz . As a soldier he says he always had books by Kant and Einstein with him. After the university clinics in Königsberg fell victim to the devastating British bombing raids on the city center in August 1944 , Klumbies continued his studies in Greifswald . He experienced the end of the war with the invasion of the Americans as a Famulus in Aue (Saxony) and Lichtenstein / Sa. After the hospital there was closed, Klumbies went to Jena, where he first had to help rebuild the university clinics. In 1946 he completed his studies with the state examination and became an assistant doctor at the women's clinic, but soon afterwards in internal medicine. In 1951 Hellmuth Kleinsorge became head of the university's medical polyclinic and thus head of Klumbies. The teaching assignment of Kleinsorge included psychotherapy and psychoanalysis . At the beginning of the 1950s, Kleinsorge set up a department for "internal psychotherapy" at his clinic, and appointed Klumbies to head it. However, he continued to see himself as an internist with a focus on the “functional side of the organs”. He was quite critical of psychoanalysis. Nor did he submit to Pavlov's “materialistic psychology” . Kleinsorge and Klumbies in particular further developed the suggestive treatment methods, Klumbies especially pain therapy with ablation hypnosis . From 1953 Klumbies conducted psychotherapy courses at the Medical University Polyclinic Jena, Reinhardsbrunn Castle, Gera and Warnemünde. He completed his habilitation and received a professorship .

The textbook “Psychotherapy in Clinic and Practice” by Kleinsorge and Klumbies could only appear in West Germany. It was not until 1974 that the “Psychotherapy in Internal and General Medicine” by Klumbies appeared for the GDR alone; the name Kleinsorge - who fled the GDR in 1968 - had to be deleted from the text for political reasons. The book had five editions by 1988. The Jena Medical University Polyclinic - whose director Klumbies had become the successor to Kleinsorge in 1962 - became a psychotherapeutic center under Klumbies in the GDR, with a focus on suggestive procedures. The psychosomatic ward set up by Klumbies in 1985 existed in the medical clinic until 2004. The medical outpatient clinic, headed by Klumbies, comprised almost all internal specialist areas and also had a ward.

In 1959, Klumbies had to take on tasks in the medical faculty which, according to his own admission, were so demanding that he could no longer devote himself fully to psychotherapy. In 1960, as Medical Director and Vice Dean, together with Rector Bolck, he applied for the University Hospital to be relocated from the city center to Jena-Lobeda . He led a corresponding planning group consisting of all clinic directors, university administration, city administration, higher-level health authorities, social bodies and the government. During the GDR era only the clinic for internal medicine was built in Lobeda. In 1985 Klumbies retired.

Then came the Peaceful Revolution in the GDR in 1989/90 . “The turning point was the dream of my life…. It was my dearest wish to firstly experience the reunification of Germany and secondly to see Königsberg again. Both have then been fulfilled. Only in psychotherapy did things turn out a little differently than I had imagined. ”“ After the fall of the Wall, there was suddenly only psychoanalysis and behavioral therapy ”. Klumbies was also bothered by the dominance of the financial billing of these services.

The first wife of Klumbies died in 1953 of complications from tuberculosis. The second marriage resulted in two sons.

Medical societies

• Klumbies was a founding member of the Society for Medical Psychotherapy (GÄP) of the GDR. He acted as secretary for many years on their board. He chaired the Hypnosis and Autogenic Training Section of the GÄP.

Honorary memberships

• Society for Medical Psychotherapy of the GDR
• Austrian Society for Scientific Hypnosis
• German Society for Hypnosis and Autogenic Training
• Milton-Erickson Society for Clinical Hypnosis

Awards

• Senior Medical Council
• John Rittmeister Medal of the Society for Medical Psychotherapy
• Lifetime Award from the German Society for Hypnosis and Hypnotherapy

Works

• with Hellmuth Kleinsorge: Psychotherapy in clinic and practice . Urban and Schwarzenberg-Verlag, Munich / Berlin 1959.
• with Hellmuth Kleinsorge: Technique of relaxation - self-relaxation . Gustav Fischer Verlag, Jena 1961.
• Psychotherapy in internal and general medicine . Hirzel-Verlag, Leipzig 1974.

literature

• Psychotherapy in East Germany. History and stories . Michael Geyer (Ed.). Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 2011, ISBN 978-3-525-40177-4 .
  • In it: Psychotherapy in the Soviet zone of occupation. Jena: Gerhard Klumbies: The beginnings in Jena 1945–1959. Pp. 63-66.
  • In it: Bernhard Strauss: Gerhard Klumbies - pioneer of psychosomatics in East Germany. Pp. 73-79.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Bernhard Strauss: Gerhard Klumbies - Pioneer of Psychotherapy in East Germany. In: Michael Geyer (Ed.): Psychotherapy in East Germany. Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 2011, p. 78.