About the book

A popular misconception about the concept of psychosomatic medicine is the belief that the identification of psyche-based triggers for somatic [physically] evidenced symptoms is equivalent to a dismissal of the problem as 'all in the mind', or worse, as a way of blaming the patient for their own often dangerous and disabling diseases.

This fascinating and scrupulous guide uses detailed transcripts of interview between the physicians and the patients to reveal to the reader the complex individual factors which can contribute to why we may fall ill, why with that particular disease and why at that point in time. Armed with this knowledge the authors of this book found that they could help people infinitely more effectively.

This book is a useful practical guide to all practitioners in the healing professions about how to listen, what to listen for and how to use that information to help the patient.

While it is clearly a medical textbook, it remains accessible to the lay reader and to health professionals from other disciplines and traditions.

Our objective in reprinting it is to make a lifetime of clinical experience available to a wider public and to show that the perceived bad cop/good cop divide between the practice of 'scientific medicine ' and more alternative approaches is not necessarily the only, or most productive way.

Sarah Paulley