A sanatorium is an institution where people suffering from physical or mental problems can go for treatment and recuperation. Often, the natural resources of the area in which a sanatorium is located, such as mineral springs, or clean mountain air, are used as part of the treatment or cure. In general, a sanatorium was designed to treat people suffering from a particular disease, such as tuberculosis.

Sanatoriums (also called sanitariums), were common in Europe for centuries, but they didn't become popular in the United States until the latter part of the 1800s.

American physician Edward Livingston Trudeau (1848-1915) is credited with popularizing the use of sanatoriums in the United States. Trudeau, who had contracted tuberculosis while nursing his brother through the disease, founded the first American tuberculosis sanatorium in 1885; he started what became known as the "sanatorium movement" in the United States.

After he became ill with his...