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Three professors, all prominent reprentatives of Finnish psychiatry and well-known from international research have written a comprehensive textbook in psychiatry in two volumes which was published in Finnish for the first time in 1971. It has subsequently appeared in a 5th edition. A shortened volume has now, been translated into Swedish, aimed at the Swedish-speaking part of the Finnish student polulation who until now have had to use foreign textbooks.
The book is divided into 15 chapters, whereof the introductory chapters deal with the history of psychiatry and its development in Finland, basic concepts in psychopathology, the dynamics of personality and family-system. The developmental aspects based on Freud's theory are described; further, the importance of the separation/individuation phase in generating the psychic disorders with reference to the work of Margaret Mahler as well as the interactions in the familiy-system, where the modern theories of Kohut, Stierlin and Wynne are presented.
Then follow chapters on psychiatric research, interviews and anamnesis. The importance of observation and exact diagnosis as necessary for a successful therapy are stated, as well as the psychodynamic interaction in the interview situation. The authors then dwell upon specific psychic disorders, like the various neuroses and character disorders, including the disputed narcissistic personality disorders and the borderline states, where both Kohut's and Kernberg's views are concidered.
Subsequently, schizophrenia and the paranoid psychoses, maniodepressive illnesses and the involutional psychoses, reactive psychoses (a term only used in the Scandinavian countries), psychosomatic illnesses, psychic