The families of 26 school non‐attending adolescents (15 phobics, 11 truants) took part in a special task interview which was observed and video taped. The Summary Format for Family Interaction and Family Description Form were used to describe the families. Characteristic items were observed more frequently in phobic than truant families. The two items that discriminated statistically between the groups, and could therefore be said to characterize phobic families, involved the index child's behaviour within the family, notably his passivity and lack of initiative, his sadness and appearance of having given up. A number of other items just failed to reach statistical significance. A pattern of interaction in phobic families is suggested and the nature of its relationship with the phobic symptom is discussed. A developmental model is used to explain some of the differences seen in families of adolescents.

SummaryThis paper presents work that formed the basis of a fourth-year project at Southampton University Medical School. Thirty patients were seen prior to their first psychiatric consultation and asked about their hopes, fears and expectations. Twenty-five were seen subsequently.The study, which is largely descriptive, shows that many patients have unrealistic expectations about various aspects of the interview, and afterwards many are dissatisfied with its outcome. The paper discusses these findings and makes some tentative recommendations.

The aim of audit is to monitor and evaluate clinical practice with the intention of refining and improving practice. Once implemented the changes can in turn be monitored, creating the audit cycle. This paper illustrates one way to capitalise on the changes generated by an auditing process in an in-patient adolescent unit.

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