Abstract
Background: Alcohol treatment in institutions following the "Apolinar Model" has a long tradition in what is now the Czech Republic. Historically, there were three pivotal facilities of this type: Apolinar, the Lojovice alcohol institution, established in 1958 and later transformed into a women's facility, and a treatment facility that was opened in Červený Dvůr.
Aims: To map the history of the establishment and development of the Červený Dvůr institution. Methods: Data was collected using document analysis which involved the identification of relevant sources, particularly the "therapeutic aid" Červený Dvůr Journey, Apolinar Records, the specialist journals Československá psychiatrie [Czechoslovak Psychiatry] and Alkoholický obzor [Alcoholic Horizon], and primary records kept on file in the institution and the State Regional Archives in Český Krumlov.
The library of the Regional Office of the National Heritage Institute in České Budějovice also proved to be a valuable source of information. The documentary evidence was combined with semistructured interviews with the study participants, including one of the head physicians in the institution, Jiří Dvořáček, as well as Arnoštka Maťová, and Zbyněk Bohdal.
Open coding was used to analyse the data. Then the data collected from the interviews was matched with data from the literature and archived records.
Finally, the results were projected onto a timeline. Results and conclusions: The study points out issues which could also be encountered by other similar institutions in Czechoslovakia and what was later to become the Czech Republic.
This could make it a useful guide to a more thorough understanding of the constitution of institutional treatment in our country.