APsaA President Gourguechon's Blog

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2009-11-06T07:36:00.001-08:00

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Inside Dope on Health Care Reform Timetable: Predictions of a DC Health Policy Wonk

2009-07-09T12:21:00.000-07:00

A friend of a friend of the American Psychoanalytic Association has worked for many years, in many capacities, as a health care policy "guy" in Washington DC. The members of APsaA are understandably concerned about and invested in numerous aspects of health care policy, both reform and otherwise. Among our top concerns are protecting patient privacy, preserving the right to private contracting

"Words are the healers of the sick temper"

2009-07-09T11:58:00.001-07:00

My colleague Paul M. Brinich, Ph.D., Clinical Professor, Departments of Psychology and Psychiatry,University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and faculty, Psychoanalytic Education Center of the Carolinas offers this wonderful collection of quotes --primarily from literature with a few from Sigmund Freud-- that convey in a few perfect words the muddles of human nature, the misery of neurosis, and

The American Psychoanalytic Association and Torture--no Moral Ambiguity

2009-04-23T20:01:00.000-07:00

For those of us in the mental health field, one of the more shocking aspects of the Department of Justice memos regarding “enhanced interrogation” released by the Obama Administration last weekend was the description of the central role of a psychologist (or psychologists) in justifying the techniques used—waterboarding, isolation, humiliation, etc. It appears that the

Psychoanalysis and gay rights--40 years of change

2009-04-23T19:52:00.000-07:00

Reflecting on the 40th Anniversary of the Stonewall rebellion, the New York Times published a most peculiar piece on Sunday April 12. Titled “Word for Word: Deviates and Inverts” the anonymous "Week in Review" piece seemed to be a kind of apology for the language and attitude the Times presented as “news” about homosexuality in 1963.In their broadly quoted “news” story of the early 1960’s, the

The Ethical Centrality of Patient Consent

2009-04-07T03:40:00.000-07:00

A few days ago, I received a call from a company describing itself as an agent of my patient's health insurer, charged with the task of determining the "medical necessity" of her treatment. (A haunted term I was pleased not to have heard in a while). I told the caller that I didn't have a consent from the patient to release the information they wanted, which included "physician's orders,

News Analysis

2009-02-07T16:05:00.001-08:00

What's up with all the rude people? Viewers of a Boston television station wanted to know, and the reporter assigned to investigate ended up on former APsaA president Dr. Robert Pyle's psychoanalytic couch in order to find the answers to his troubling questions about human nature. Why do trash collectors throw around the cans? Why do drivers fail to signal a left turn? And why do smokers drop

Patient Privacy and the Stimulus Package

2009-01-29T20:27:00.000-08:00

Round one of the Stimulus Package passed the U.S. House of Representatives this week. The American Psychoanalytic Association has been lobbying for privacy protections in the bill, since on of its major components is a section that would promote development of a comprehensive health information technology system. APsaA has long been concerned about the potential for violation of confidentiality

The Emerging Evidence Base for Psychodynamic Psychotherapy--named a top psychiatry story of 2008

2009-01-21T15:31:00.000-08:00

Seven stories were chosen as the Top Psychiatry Stories of 2008 by Journal Watch Psychiatry, a publication of the Massachusetts Medical Society, which describes itself as "an editorially independent literature-surveillance newsletter summarizing articles from major medical journals". The January 2009 issue (Vol 15 No. 1) introduces a new feature, Top Stories of the preceding year. The editors

The Long Haul--Meeting the needs of those who serve

2009-01-19T13:20:00.000-08:00

I've just returned from APsaA's winter meeting, which was so full of riches that it could feed this blog for months to come. One of many important themes at our meeting related to the needs of those who suffer psychological injury from war, and their families who suffer secondary and often severe trauma as well. Marie Rudden (chair of APsaA's Psychoanalysis and the Community Committee) and I

Mad Women and the Right to Privacy

2008-12-16T20:19:00.000-08:00

Mad Men, a hip and quirky TV drama on AMC, won the NY magazine's vote for best TV show of 2008 in their review of "The Year in Culture" (New York Magazine, Dec 13, 2008). The show's premise is unappetizing--a bunch of drinking- before- lunch Madison Avenue advertising executives in 1960, busily engaged in sexual harassment of their secretaries, with pre Betty Friedan wives writhing in neurotic

The Unconscious--2nd Place Prize from CNN

2008-12-15T19:06:00.000-08:00

I'm grateful to APsaA member Paul Brinich, a reliable source of interesting and sometimes quirky information, for calling our attention to a wonderful article on the European edition of CNN's website. CNN's Mairi Mackay wrote the piece, which lays out the staff's list of the ten best ideas, ever. The first is farming, not to be argued with. But the second is the psychoanalytic concept of the

My neighbor, Governor Rod Blogojevich

2008-12-11T17:59:00.000-08:00

For the last year, while gutting and remodeling my home and office a couple of miles East, I have lived in an apartment in a NW side neighborhood of Chicago sometimes called Albany Park, and sometimes called Ravenswood Manor, depending on which side of the class divide you're on. One block North of my apartment is the home of now notorious Illinois Governor Rod Blogojevich. Right now the streets

Pragmatism, George Engle and PPP

2008-12-07T15:52:00.000-08:00

There's a journal I've subscribed to for a couple of years that I like very much. It's called Philosophy, Psychiatry and Psychology (PPP) and is a joint American-- British effort with an international editorial board of, not surprisingly, psychiatrists, psychologists and philosophers. The latest issue is devoted to a consideration of George Engel's biopsychosocial model, which Engel unveiled in

Keith Olberman makes a pretty good interpretation

2008-12-02T19:31:00.000-08:00

I'm continuing on the theme of how come, if we're obsolete etc, sparks of psychoanalytic thinking crop up regularly in the most unexpected places?Here's the background. Item one, for those of you who don't know, Keith Olberman is a former football player, former sportscaster turned political opinion/news show host with a nightly hour on MSNBC. He is an unabashed liberal.Item two, George Bush is

The Iconic Couch

2008-11-29T11:41:00.000-08:00

Here's what I don't understand. As a psychoanalytic organization we struggle to refute the old canard that "psychoanalysis is dead". We fight to ensure that psychoanalytic theory and therapy are still taught in the core mental health professions of psychiatry, psychology and social work. We labor on public information efforts to make sure that people are still aware of our profession and our

Waxman Chairmanship Bodes Well

2008-11-21T16:54:00.000-08:00

Congressman Henry Waxman (D-CA) has unseated Congressman Dingell (D-MI) as chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee. This could be a positive development for privacy protections in health IT legislation (electronic medical records). Mr. Waxman was very helpful to APsaA in its efforts to promote the inclusion of a provision in the Energy and Commerce HIT bill that expressly

Daschle to be HHS Secretary--will he uphold his own views on health information privacy?

2008-11-21T16:27:00.000-08:00

The Obama transition team has named former Democratic Senator Tom Daschle as the Presdient-Elect's pick for Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services. APsaA's Legislative representative, Jim Pyles, reports the following:Senator Daschle, as Senate majority leader in 2000, established the Congressional Privacy Caucus which is currently co-chaired by Congressman Ed Markey. In

Military Families top priority of new first lady

2008-11-19T16:13:00.000-08:00

On Veteran's Day APsaA announced its Soldiers and Veterans Initiative . I was very pleased to hear Michelle Obama say, in last week's interview on 60 Minutes, that meeting the needs of military and veterans families would be an area of focus for her as First Lady. It's gratifying how many Americans, both as individuals and as activist groups, are trying to make a contribution to the needs of