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June 24, 1952. A DETERRENT IN THE STUDY AND PRACTICE OF MEDICINE. I. Peter Glauber, M.D.
Dr. Glauber sorts from extensive data obtained from five analyses those which illuminate certain symptomatic inhibitions in the study and practice of medicine. Lewin states in the discussion that this is the first paper to direct itself specifically to what might be called the neurosis of doctors. The paper does not suggest, however, that an occupational disease is being delineated.
Reference is made to the contributions of Freud, Simmel, Rôheim, Nunberg, Brill and Lewin to the phylogenetic and ontogenetic roots of the transference and countertransference relationships of patients and physicians. Brill's paper on necrophilia affords illuminating case material which supplements some of Glauber's specific data.
Aside from studies of the countertransference in analysis, the analytic literature is surprisingly meager in clinical data concerning neurotic inhibitions in the study and practice of medicine.
The five cases include two medical students and three practicing physicians. Preoedipal fixations characterize the group and are the nuclei of their neurotic manifestations. Part-object identifications with the preoedipal mother and consequent inability to establish total object identifications were observed in these physician patients. An inability to maintain flexible distances for optimal