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Persons with HIV infection are confronted with discrimination in addition to devastating illnesses that result in profound emaciation, weakness, depression, confusion, disfigurement, and, ultimately, death (Cohen and Weisman, 1986). The support engendered by group psychotherapy can combat stigma and provide the kind of environment that results in the group transformation experience described by Carl Jung in his 1939 essay “Concerning Rebirth”:
The identification of an individual with a number of people who, as a group, have a collective experience of transformation [leads to] a positive enthusiasm which spurs the individual to noble deeds, and an equally positive feeling of human solidarity. The group can give the individual a courage, a bearing, and a dignity which may easily get lost in isolation. (Jung, 1939/1980, p. 127)
Group psychotherapy can provide a nurturing, holding environment for persons with HIV infection. We will describe our experiences leading HIV support groups in a municipal hospital and in an AIDS long-term-care facility in order to demonstrate the usefulness and feasibility of such groups for persons with severe medical illness. Group psychotherapy for the medically ill has been described in the literature for nearly a century; in this article we present an overview in order to provide an historical perspective.
The summer of 1905 marked the beginning of group psychotherapy with the medically ill. In July of 1905, Dr. Joseph Pratt and Reverend Elwood Worcester founded the Emmanuel Church Tuberculosis Class.