Abstract

TIZON, Jorge L. How to improve the integrative approach in clinicians: a review of Balint and reflection groups (I). Rev. Asoc. Esp. Neuropsiq. [online]. 2019, vol.39, n.136, pp.19-43.  Epub Sep 21, 2020. ISSN 2340-2733.  https://dx.doi.org/10.4321/s0211-57352019000200002.

Balint groups, belatedly recognized by medical specialties in our country, meant an important contribution to the training and continuing education of health personnel, and, in my opinion, of personnel across all healthcare services. However, they are only a part of a welfare model: the model based on public assistance, solidarity, communitarianism, and comprehensive care. In this regard, neoliberal ideologies, policies and economies in care settings propose another model of assistance and “formation” (or deformation?) of doctors and health care personnel. Its progressive advance is one of the fundamental explanations for the decline in the use of comprehensive training procedures, ongoing training, and training for reparation. Precisely, these were the basic objectives of Balint and reflection groups, which led them to play a relevant part in the training of family and community medicine specialists in many first and second world countries during the eighties and nineties of the twentieth century. In this paper a brief description of the diffusion and extension of Balint-type groups is made, both nationally and internationally. Drawing on other previous works on the subject, some of their variants and applications are pointed out. My current perspective is that reflection groups, as systems of containment and training of care and community personnel, continue to be a technique or system that could provide important support for these objectives. However, they are being progressively cornered in Western training systems with the complicit silence of many health administrators and teachers, including psychoanalysts.

Keywords : Groups; Mental health training; Balint groups; Reflection groups; Psychosomatics; Liaison psychiatry; Doctor-patient relationship.

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