[The physician-patient relation through a Balint group].
OBJECTIVE
To evaluate by means of a contents analysis a Balint Group (BG) after 7 years in operation, to find which type of patients are most disturbing for the General Practitioner and to analyse the sort of feelings they provoke.


METHODS
A retrospective descriptive study which uses qualitative analysis methodology.


METHODS
The BG under analysis was created in the heart of the Catalan Society of Family and Community Medicine in 1984.


METHODS
21 sessions were analysed, covering 18 patients.


METHODS
The variables studied were: the motives for presentation, the sort of patient presenting and the doctor's feeling towards them.


RESULTS
Two types of patients stood out: those with somatization disorders and those with a very poor prognosis. The first (12 out of 18) unsettled the professional and caused him/her to lose grip on his/her role. The GP often trivialised their requests or thought they were pretending. Those sessions analysed where patients had a poor prognosis made clear the high degree of empathy shown by the doctor. Questions were raised as to how to tackle the illness both with the patient and his/her family. Feelings of distress, fear, anguish-exhaustion-impotence and rejection-aggression of the doctor towards particular patients were analysed.


CONCLUSIONS
The questioning of the doctor's social role or professional identity by particular patients makes it difficult for him/her to maintain a long-term therapeutic relationship with them. The BG was useful for the participants, because of the group dynamic and also because they found out the possibilities and limitations of their treatment.
Fernández de Sanmamed
M
M
Societat Catalana de Medicina Familiar i Comunitària, Mallorca, Barcelona.
Iglesias
C
C
Moretó
A
A
Naberán
C
C
Rodríguez
M L
ML
Ferrer
R
R
D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D010361:Patients / Q000145:classification / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D010817:Physician-Patient Relations; D010821:Physicians, Family / Q000523:psychology / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D011379:Prognosis; D011575:Psychoanalytic Therapy / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D012189:Retrospective Studies; D012681:Sensitivity Training Groups / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D013030:Spain / Q000453:epidemiology
La relación médico-paciente a través de un grupo Balint.