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The crucial factor in determining the kind of therapy best for the borderline schizophrenic is a careful appraisal of the patient's ego-functioning with regard to its external adaptive and internal defensive aspects. This will indicate the advantage or danger in using exploratory techniques, deep interpretations, permissiveness, restrictiveness, and so forth. Decisions about status as out-patient or in-patient and about open or closed hospital facilities are also based on this same appraisal. This appraisal of the functions of the ego can best be made from several consultations, from objective history, from reliable informants, and from psychological testing. The strengthening and rebuilding of the ego should receive prior consideration over exploration until the therapist is sure of his ground with respect to the patient's ego strength. Knight believes that open hospital treatment, which makes maximum use of group psychological forces combined with individual psychotherapy, may make it possible for the borderline schizophrenic to hold himself together while he works toward reintegration. Ideally, a therapist should be capable of considerable flexibility in his responses so that he can adapt himself with genuineness and spontaneity to the widely varying therapeutic situations that occur in borderline cases.