TEACHING THE INTERPRETIVE PROCESS TO MEDICAL STUDENTS
SIDNEY L. WERKMAN M.D.1
1 Research Associate, Children's Hospital of the District of Columbia, Clinical Instructor in Psychiatry, George Washington University School of Medicine, Washington, D. C.
We are by no means finished in our exploration of better ways to teach the interpretive process, and it is obvious that many other factors not covered here are involved in the process. Certainly a great deal of psychiatric learning occurs before this experience just as a music student masters volumes of scales and technical exercises before he is able to enjoy working on a concerto. The interpretive process in psychiatry is a concerto with specific technical, organizational, dynamic and stylistic demands. In the teaching of this process, questions about child development can be clarified, distinctions between diagnostic interpretation and psychotherapy are made, problems concerning the weighting of organic disorders can be examined, some prejudices about psychiatry can be melted and the student's identity as a physician can be strengthened.
Student response to this method of teaching is of interest. Following the actual interpretation interview, we discuss their impressions with the students. Here are several of them: "We were just slugging it out with her. I didn't know where I was going part of the time. The main thing, though, is until now I didn't see how we could do anything, and now I think we've really helped her." Another: "When I found out I had to come over here, I thought, `Oh, God, listen to somebody else's troubles.' But this was different. This brought everything together. I never knew what psychiatry was before this."
The enthusiasm and involvement of students in this program suggest that it is valuable to focus on teaching this phase of psychiatry. This paper has been an attempt to detail one method of doing so and to discuss issues that arise in the course of this teaching process.
