No abstract

Pseudocyesis is rare in childhood and adolescence. Moreover, in all age groups, there has been little written on its therapeutic handling. We describe a case of pseudocyesis in a fifteen-year-old girl and discuss the therapy in some detail.

A medical myth is defined as a false or distorted belief regarding issues of health within a family. This empirical study considers phenomenology, function and origins of medical myths operating in some forty families encountered in the author's psychiatric practice. Therapeutic strategies found useful in re‐editing the myths are described. Implications for the family/medical professional relationship are discussed.

Many families, willingly or unwillingly, collect a professional network which can act either to facilitate or to hinder natural growth within the family. This article offers a classification of network actions that can contribute to a family's stuckness and incompetence. These include the network advance, invasion, freeze, scapegoating, over-protection and the classic multi-agency mirror. Recognizing and dealing with network problems from the perspective of a clinic is briefly considered.

to understand the genuine needs of psychiatry such as improving the training of the multi-disciplinary team, allocating more resources and improving the immediate environment of patients. Psychiatrists do not seem to be able to promote psychiatry and to be influential in decision-making.