We all have the choice to learn what are often difficult truths behind how our society functions. We can also choose to stay willfully ignorant to the dark shadows that look over our everyday existence. This existential concept is the main premise behind the Matrix film series. The newest installment of the Matrix uses the Riverview Hospital, in Coquitlam B.C as a filming location. The Matrix franchise is not the first to use Riverview Hospital. The hospital has become a staple in horror and suspense films and series productions in Canada. You can see it featured in X-Files, Smallville, Riverdale series and horror films: Halloween Resurrection, Butterfly Effect, Final Destination 2, Shutter Island along with many others. This location is quietly nestled in the small suburban city of Coquitlam less than 15km outside Vancouver, British Columbia. Some might recognize Coquitlam as the home of Robert Pickton, one of Canada’s most horrific serial killers.
The Riverview Hospital was a mental health institution built over a century ago with a long and dark history. The walls have borne witness to many tragic events. It is thought to house many more ghosts than patients these days. With only a few patients still occupying one of the older buildings, mostly in high-security units for those deemed criminally insane.
Riverview mental health asylum opened in 1904. The institution was built on 405 hectares of land. During its inception, the intention was to have the facilities located in a beautiful natural setting, which even included its farm, Colony Farm, which would help the therapeutic treatment of patients. By 1913, the first permanent ward opened, and quickly it was filled to double its capacity with over 900 patients. It is thought that the institution had good intentions and was considered extremely progressive for its time and even recognized as a model of psychiatric care. Perhaps this was true, but upon opening its doors the sheer over-capacity from the beginning created an environment where the conditions were extremely poor. Over the next few years, more wards opened up: The Boys Industrial School for Juvenile Delinquents, an Acute Psychopathic Unit, a Female Chronic Building, and a Veterans' Block opened for shell shock patients from the First World War to name a few. By 1956 the asylum housed upward of 5,000 patients.
Definitions of insanity in the 21st century are quite different from today. Patients ranged from those who had run-ins with the law to women who were committed by their relatives for not performing their gender roles accordingly. During this period, men were often committed to afflictions that were hereditary such as mania and depression. While also being locked up for
intemperance, syphilis, and masturbation.
Many experiments and treatments were used at this institution that is now seen as barbaric, and lawsuits were filed against the hospital in later years. Between 1940 and 1968 the B.C. government had embraced eugenics, and sterilization was common at the Riverview Hospital. It was believed that the sterilization of people with mental health issues, criminals, and even the poor would improve society. Most of the sterilizations occurred with women patients. In 2005, 9 women who experienced this traumatic procedure were awarded $450,000. There were close to 200 women sterilized during 1940-1968. By the 1960s, patient numbers were declining in part because of the introduction of psychiatric medications and hospitals opening up psychiatric wards on site.
By the 1980s, society's views of mental health issues and treatment had shifted. Over 30 years many patients were released and the institutions began to crumble. There are different sentiments on the shutting down of mental illness asylums. While the Riverview Hospital had poor conditions, controversial treatments and, like other institutions at the time, patients that did not warrant being there at all. There were facets of their institution that can be viewed favourably.
Closing its doors may seem like a victory but releasing patients after enduring traumatic experiences and many still suffering mental health issues without any help was disastrous. This happened all over Canada and many people with mental health issues who were living in these institutions became unhoused. Many Riverview Hospital patients ended up on the streets of the downtown eastside in Vancouver, a location known today for desperate people living in the direst and impoverished situations. Others ended up in the prison system.
In the 2000s, Riverview and the BC government were heavily criticized for the use of practices such as electroshock therapy, hydrotherapy and induced insulin comas. Electroshock therapy is a controversial psychiatric treatment in which a generalized seizure is imposed on the brain through electronic “shocks”. This treatment has been heavily criticized and has become less common today, though still used in some circumstances. An inquiry was done at Riverview Hospital into the elevated use of the treatment when it coincided with the doctors being paid extra when giving the procedure. In December 2000, staff at the hospital contacted the provincial health minister of British Columbia with concern over the alarming rate Shock Therapy was being administered. The use of the treatment had doubled since the extra compensation to doctors had begun. Hydrotherapy was another controversial treatment given to patients who suffered insomnia, restlessness and acute psychosis. This treatment involved patients being put in hot baths for up to 9 hours at a time. Insulin Coma Therapy was another disputed treatment in which patients were repeatedly injected with large doses of insulin to induce daily comas for several weeks. This was often given to patients suffering from Schizophrenia.
It would be dishonest to paint a picture of the institution as just an abusive, decrepit asylum for the duration of its history. Looking at the larger picture, the Riverview Hospital was also a highly functioning and interesting case study for self-sufficiency. Riverview Hospital at its peak had 80 buildings on site and had created a self-sufficient mini-society. Colony Farm and its patient workers were producing large amounts of crops and milk. This is considered a form of Occupational Therapy, where work is given as a positive alternative to confinement and punishment. Within this mini-society was a post office, bakery, chapel, cinema, bowling alley, Firehall, bus station and more. The institution hosted parades, picnics and sports on the ground. Many patients lived at the hospital for 20 or 30 years until they were released upon it shutting down. While the institution itself must be held accountable for its actions in harming people, especially within the context of grandiose misuse of medical treatments for financial gain. This place could also be seen as an example of an institution mirroring negative ways in which the larger society views certain people and how they are to be dealt with during a specific time. The Riverview hospital was using practices that were heavily supported by the government and were not uncommon during that period across North America.
Today, the grounds of Riverview hold many decrepit abandoned buildings which are often visited by urban explorers and ghost hunters. The grounds are home to an arboretum of over 1,900 trees and much wildlife. Outside of being a popular spooky filming location, this year, a new mental health and addictions rehab facility was built on the ground. Despite a land claim by the Kwkikwetlem First Nation that has been in the works for 20 years, requesting the land to be returned to its original indigenous custodians, rather than for continued development of new institutions and housing projects. The new facility that has just been built is once again seen as a modern advanced space for mental health support, much like its predecessor. We can only hope that in our modern days of more understanding of mental health it can be of support rather than cause harm.
Researched and Written by Monica Victoria
Related Links:
https://vancouver.citynews.ca/2020/11/30/riverview-hospital-coquitlam-psychiatric/
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/bc-probes-big-increase-in-shock-
treatments/article18428557/
https://vancouversun.com/news/closure-of-riverview-hospital-marks-end-of-era-in-mental-health-
treatment
REFERENCES:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_pill_and_blue_pill
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/british-columbia/dark-history-may-temper-public-input-
on-former-hospital-at-riverview/article17131074/
https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/robert-pickton-case
