From psychosomatic medicine to psychoanalytic psychosomatics

Psychoanalytical psychosomatics

Abstract

The second half of the twentieth century saw the birth of medical psycho-somatics. The pioneering works of F. Alexander, F. Dunbar, and P. Sifneos revealed important links between personality traits, the emotional sphere, and somatic diseases. Soon IPSO (IPSO, Institute of Psychosomatics) appeared in Paris. Its representatives described the peculiarities of functioning of patients who somatize more often than others. In the presence of fixation- regression system due to regression there appear benign in course, reversible somatizations, as opposed to progressive disorganization leading to serious illnesses and even death.