Psychosomatic Group Therapy with Parents of Children with Intractable Asthma. IV: The Saul Family

Abstract

This is the fourth in a series of reports by the authors, two therapists who over a five-year period worked with groups of parents of hospitalized intractably asthmatic children. Verbatim recordings were made of all group sessions, and at the conclusion of the program, the therapists had over 500 hours of transcribed material with which to work and draw conclusions. In an attempt to give proper perspective to the wealth of data, it was decided to pinpoint the interaction of individual families with the co-therapists, rather than attempt to summarize the interaction of the group as a whole. The material was screened with the purpose of portraying varying types of families where the emotional climate in the home might have led to intractability of the asthmatic syndrome. The purpose of the therapists in this particular case was to give the parents in question insight into the reasons for their hostility toward their asthmatic child, who had recently returned home after prolonged hospitalization.