Teaching Doctors

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31597, 7 February 1968, Page 12

Teaching Doctors

Two experts from Britain on the teaching of general practitioners, Drs Michael and Enid Balint, will visit Christchurch in March and April. The visit will be sponsored by the Canterbury faculty of the Royal College of General Practitioners. The bringing of the Balints to New Zealand for a month of teaching seminars will give doctors opportunities usually available only in London.

The College of General Practitioners, recognising the need for general physicians to work more closely with other disciplines, is inviting social workers, clinical psychologists and clergymen to take part in some of the seminars with the visitors.

Dr Michael Balint has been investigating general practice and the teaching of general practitioners in London since 1950. In 1961, when he retired from the Tavistock Clinic, he joined the staff of the department of psychological medicine at University College Hospital where he still conducts seminars for practising doctors and medical students. Dr Enid Balint is interested in general practice. She is a psychologist and trained psychoanalyst, and was the founder and moving spirit of the family discussion bureau at the Tavistock Clinic. The Balints will hold courses in Christchurch at St Helens and Calvary Hospitals from March 17 to March 25, and after visits to Dunedin and Auckland, will return to Christchurch for other seminars from April 8 until April 17.