These images of abandoned hospitals across Italy are not for the faint-hearted. Both of the hospitals featured in the photographs are Italian asylums – known as manicomios – that were used as mental hospitals. Shut down by law in 1978, the derelict buildings are visibly overgrown and make for very eerie portraits. Photographer Thomas Windisch, 32, of Graz, Austria, said the asylums, located in top-secret spots, can get very creepy when there aren't many people there with him. Here: a ray of light beams down on a decaying theatre in an abandoned hospital. (Photo by Thomas Windisch/Caters News)





Old TBC reports. (Photo by Thomas Windisch/Caters News)





An office in an abandoned hospital. Old files litter the floor. (Photo by Thomas Windisch/Caters News)





A living quaters in the asylums kitchen block. (Photo by Thomas Windisch/Caters News)





An asylums entrance hall. (Photo by Thomas Windisch/Caters News)





An old treatment room. (Photo by Thomas Windisch/Caters News)





A hallway within an abandoned hospital. (Photo by Thomas Windisch/Caters News)





An angled view of a winding staircase. (Photo by Thomas Windisch/Caters News)





An old operating room left to decay. (Photo by Thomas Windisch/Caters News)





A dolls pram creepily sits underneath some graffiti. (Photo by Thomas Windisch/Caters News)





A hallway of an abandoned hospital. (Photo by Thomas Windisch/Caters News)





Looking like something from a horror movie, this freakish opearting chair sits in the bowels of an abandoned hospital. (Photo by Thomas Windisch/Caters News)





A pair of shoes on a dirty window ledge. (Photo by Thomas Windisch/Caters News)





A decrepit shower room. (Photo by Thomas Windisch/Caters News)





Bottles of chemicals and syringes in a shadowy room. (Photo by Thomas Windisch/Caters News)





Four leather waiting chairs. (Photo by Thomas Windisch/Caters News)





An operating bed lies in the shadows as x-rays litter the window. (Photo by Thomas Windisch/Caters News)





Old surgical equipment. (Photo by Thomas Windisch/Caters News)