Book Notices

FOCAL PSYCHOTHERAPY: AN EXAMPLE OF APPLIED PSYCHOANALYSIS. By Michael Balint, Paul H. Ornstein, and Enid Balint. London: Tavistock Publications, 1972, 166 pp., $10.00.

This book evaluates the techniques and processes of "focal" psychotherapy by means of a detailed description of the interaction between patient and therapist throughout the treatment and follow-up of one patient. The concept of focal psychotherapy was developed by Michael Balint in his work on shorter forms of treatment using psychoanalytic technique. It consists in the choice of a single focus on which the treatment may be concentrated.

The substance of the book is Chapter V, which illustrates the application of this technique to the successful treatment of jealousy paranoia in a 43-year-old man who was seen over a period of 15 months for a total of 27 sessions. It also contains two follow-up sessions as well as letters and reports from the general practitioner up to six years later, which give evidence of the patient's maintenance and continued gain of the analytic insight he acquired during his treatment. The chapter is remarkable in that it consists of the individual treatment hours dictated by Michael Balint at the end of each session, classified according to what the therapist expected; the atmosphere of the session as contributed by the patient and the doctor; the main trends of the session; the interpretations that were thought of but not given; what happened to the focal aim; the outcome; and afterthoughts. All this affords the reader a fascinating view of, not only the surgical precision with which the technique is applied, but also the unspoken thoughts, including the doubts and puzzlements of the therapist. It also enables the reader to follow the red thread of the chosen focus as it runs through, regardless of time interval, from one session to the next. This section also contains the psychological test results on two separate occasions in the course of the treatment, and the abo