To the Editor:
I would like to suggest an alternative position to those developed by Drs. Brockman and Pacella concerning the public information policies of our organization. As a past chairman of the Extension Division of the San Diego Psychoanalytic Institute and now as an active participant in programming for our fledgling Psychoanalytic Foundation here in Minnesota, I have been long concerned with the issues surrounding the bringing of psychoanalysis before the lay public, both as an intellectual discipline and a treatment modality.
While acknowledging the importance of Dr. Pacella's concerns over the employment of professional public relations consultants in a nebulous open ended and ultimately expensive fashion, I also believe, as does Dr. Brockman, that we have need of such skills in this area and that they are beyond both our usual expertise and our capacities to commit our time and energies. We must find a practical and vital place for carefully planned, focused, and goal-directed public relations efforts, perhaps on an annual basis. Such activities would be greatly facilitated by employing media professionals on an ad hoc basis.
If, as Dr. Pacella suggests, the resources of the American Psychiatric Association could be made available to us, we should certainly make use of them as consultants in the planning phases of our program, hiring more staff when, as, or if it becomes necessary. It goes without saying that these efforts should be highly professional in both format and execution.
I am deeply concerned that the consequences of not taking such action or of acting in the very limited fashion that has been suggested by Dr. Pacella runs the risk of psychoanalysis over the years sinking into a quiet obscurity in the eyes of a public who comes to view it as an arcane, eccentric discipline of little relevance to the concerns of our troubled present day society. To some extent, unfortunately, this process has already begun.
Mark Leffert, M.D.
Minneapolis