In a recent paper, Parnell (1957) has criticized the Rees-Eysenck Body Index (Rees and Eysenck, 1945) on a number of grounds. He also showed that high values on the index corresponded to high values of Sheldon's ectomorphy component, while low values on the index corresponded to low values of the ectomorphy component, and high values of the endomorphy and more particularly the mesomorphy components. In this paper a brief attempt will be made to answer Parnell's criticisms and indicate why the Rees-Eysenck Body Index appears to be preferable to the Sheldon system.

The relationships between patients speaking out and measured outcome were investigated over 18 months in an out-patient group. The parameters of therapeutic progress were derived from the Symptom Check List and individualized repertory grid rating scales. Each patient's verbal participation was compared to that of other group members and to his own participation over other measurement phases. Speaking out phases were associated with more chance of change and improvement, while silent phases were associated with less chance of change and an increased likelihood of negative change. This study demonstrates the use of a relatively non-disruptive measurement model in testing clinical hypotheses in single psychotherapy groups.

We have previously suggested that a number of psychoanalytic concepts have undergone changes of meaning when extended to wider settings both within psychoanalysis and outside it (Sandler, Dare, and Holder, 1970a, b; Sandler, Holder and Dare, 1970a, b, c). This has led to situations in which the same term can have a variety of meanings attached to it, with consequent confusion and loss of precision. A clear example of this is the concept of transference, which is now given a wide range of meanings, including that of being simply a synonym for ‘relationship'—a usage substantially different from its original meaning (Sandler, Dare and Holder, 1970b).

Conventional Child Guidance treatment includes a diagnostic “work-up” of five to ten hours and then weekly psychotherapeutic and casework interviews for the child and mother which last for months or years and are very expensive of professional time. There have been few reports of evaluation of such treatment, though Levitt (1963) combined the results of a number of studies to include nearly 10,000 child patients. Of those who received treatment, between two-thirds and three-quarters were improved, but a similar improvement rate occurred in those who were not treated. Eisenberg and Gruenberg (1961) found short-term treatment as effective as intensive psychotherapy, and Phillips and Johnston (1954) and Phillips (1960) claimed better results with short than with conventional treatment. Among the few reports from Britain is that of Barbour and Beedell (1955). They found no difference in outcome between treated and untreated cases or between short and long methods of treatment.

Around 100 000 people live in mental health supported accommodation in England, at considerable cost to the public purse, but there is little evidence to guide investment in the most effective models. We consider the various barriers to research in this field and offer suggestions on how to address them.

Of all the tranquillizers, it may well be said that benactyzine has had the most chequered history. After its synthesis, a series of most careful experiments on animals demonstrated its ability to reduce or modify behaviour induced by stress. The first clinical trial gave rise to high hopes of its value in treatment but as further trials, more carefully designed, were made the results became increasingly inconclusive.

This paper sets out to demonstrate similarities of behaviour between obsessionals and hysterics in responses to perceptual conflict, which might be expected on the basis of psycho-analytical theories, but which could not be predicted from the dimensional framework of personality favoured by Eysenck in which obsessionals and hysterics are found at opposite poles of an introversion-extroversion continuum, and in which anxiety states, depressives and obsessionals are grouped together in one indistinguishable category of dysthymia.

Now that more than six years have elapsed since the introduction of leucotomy in this country, it is becoming possible to assess more accurately its remoter effects. The increasing use that is being made of the operation bears witness to the beneficial results that have been obtained by it, but the justifiable enthusiasm occasioned by the dramatic improvements it has produced in some cases apparently resistant to all other present-day methods of treatment must be tempered by a sober consideration of all the sequelae of section of the prefrontal fibres. While it is undoubted that after it many cases are sufficiently recovered to resume a full and satisfactory social life, and an even larger number are either freed from intense misery or from hostility and aggressive impulses and enabled to take a more co-operative part in the sheltered life of a hospital community, there are a few whose behaviour following the operation is definitely less satisfactory than it was even at the height of their illness. Furthermore, even in the successful cases, certain undesirable traits have often been noted.

The following study was made for the Department of Psychological Medicine at Guy's Hospital in London in May, 1933. The purpose of the study was to investigate the present condition of the first hundred patients who attended the Department in 1931. Some of the findings will be compared with those from a similar study made in New York.

Only 16 cases of folie à trois have been reported in the English literature (Wolff, 1957). The present case seems worth recording because of the rarity with which this condition is described and the problems it raises.

This thesis gives an account of the use of cortisone and adrenocorticotrophic hormone (ACTH) in the treatment of prolonged comas occurring in the course of deep insulin coma treatment. Cases in which neither hormone was used are also included. The pathology and aetiology of this type of prolonged coma are discussed and a classification of the cases seen is made.

It would seem that the overwhelming success of convulsion therapy in depressive syndromes has retarded recognition of the use of this treatment in states of excitement. Little has been written in this country on E.C.T. in mania, and apart from a report that the condition is refractory and frequently relapses, there is scant guidance on the subject. The object of this paper is to draw attention to the real value of E.C.T. in mania, when given in adequate quantity at the beginning, and followed up by frequent spacing of shocks to prevent relapse. For this purpose, “intensive therapy” is regarded as that which commences with several shocks daily until the excited state is suppressed, and by this method the most maniacal patient can be rapidly and dramatically brought under control.

This work was carried out mainly with financial assistance from the Medical Research Council, to whom the results have been com municated, and to whom our thanks are due.

Having regard to the paucity of information on the subject of the phosphorus and calcium-content of blood and cerebro-spinal fluid in the psychoses, and to the consideration that at this mental hospital a research laboratory in chemistry is available, it seemed desirable to investigate these matters.

This paper is an attempt to record the experience gained in treating 44 schizophrenics in this hospital with cardiazol from September, 1937, when the treatment was first used, to the middle of April, 1938.