Concept
Balint group
A small group of doctors, at first general practitioners, who meet regularly with a psychoanalytically trained leader to discuss cases from their own practice, attending to the relationship between doctor and patient rather than to the diagnosis alone. Michael and Enid Balint began the method at the Tavistock Clinic around 1950; it treats the doctor's own person as a drug whose effects can be studied.
Read more- Introduced by
- Michael Balint
- Key works
- 1
introduced by
- Michael Balint 1957 The Doctor, His Patient and the Illness (1957) reports the work of Balint's first discussion-cum-research seminars with general practitioners at the Tavistock Clinic. The training method it describes became known as the Balint group.
developed by
- Enid Balint 1961 Enid Balint worked with Michael Balint on the general-practitioner groups from their beginnings, co-wrote their account of psychotherapy in medical practice, and carried the method on after his death.