BALINT GROUPS OR GROUPS AIMED AT OVERCOMING PROFESSIONAL BURNOUT: DOCTORS, PSYCHOLOGISTS, PSYCHIATRISTS, PSYCHOTHERAPISTS, SOCIAL WORKERS. Why is it necessary to engage in Balint groups? Difficulties may arise in the doctor-patient relationship that will significantly affect the doctor's actions and interfere with the healing process. In a Balint group, conducted under the leadership of a recognized leader of Balint groups, its participants present cases of treatment of patients with whom problems have arisen or are emerging. In a free collegial discussion, in free associations and fantasies, group members identify the doctor-patient relationship and make a diagnosis of the relationship. In As a result, a broader picture of the problematic relationship emerges, which will later make it possible to find a different, often healing, approach to the patient. Balint groups for students While still students, doctors meet with patients. Students then treat patients in preclinical practice, practical training courses, and possibly residency. Some of the contacts with patients will be quickly forgotten, and some will certainly provide significant support in the case of special diseases. But there are always those contacts with patients that you can’t stop thinking about because they left an indelible mark. These are the things I would like to exchange opinions with my colleagues about. This could be a dying patient (or his relatives) or just some super nervige patient. There are quite a few reasons why any meeting with patients does not leave anyone alone for a long time. There is usually little time during training to devote serious attention to dealing with difficult patients. Quite often the patient is viewed as just another representative of a particular disease that is the only one discussed in training. Naturally, there is no place left for attention to “contacts.” And yet, this is one of the key points in a doctor’s activity. This is precisely the gap that the Balint group fills. It allows you to more intensively engage in contacts with problem patients, developing new strategies for work. Some universities have Balint groups for students. Students can also participate in groups held at Balint conferences. And it is quite possible that participation in the same Balint group of students and doctors will be beneficial for everyone, since both of them can bring their own personal experience. This way, it may be easier for some students to understand the problems of young people, and an experienced doctor will be able to share many well-tested strategies. What is a Balint group? A Balint group consists of 8-12 doctors who meet to discuss problem patients they encounter in clinics and private practice. The group leader is a psychotherapist and must have relevant experience in leading Balint groups, as well as understand the laws of group dynamics. Doctor and psychoanalyst Michael Balint created his group method for understanding and eliminating problems that arise in the relationship between doctor and patient. Balint spent a lot of time in specially created research seminars with practicing doctors. Today, doctors of all directions are participating in this method of improving education, and Balint groups already occupy a strong place in the training of students. The goals of Balint group participants include: - Identifying the therapeutic value of the doctor-patient relationship. - Better understanding of the patient. - More better access to problem patients. - The ability to prescribe and understand the impact of “drug pills”. - Understanding one’s own feelings towards problem patients. - Learning to listen sensitively. - Better consideration of the somatic and mental components of the disease in the sense of making an integral diagnosis.- Freeing the doctor from the need to maintain a trusting doctor-patient relationship outside the treatment room.