Psychiatrists in Primary Health Care Settings

Abstract

An increasing number of psychiatrists are now working partly in primary care settings. This paper describes how the movement began and how both psychiatrists and other members of the specialist psychiatric treatment team have explored ways of working with family doctors in the diagnosis and management of psychiatric disorders. Various styles of collaborative work, the declared advantages of such attachment schemes, the reservations being expressed about their further extension, and their research and educational potential are explored. If such enterprises, designed to help the family doctor identify psychiatric morbidity in the practice and to extend his skills in managing such patients and their relatives, are to be commended, they must be carefully monitored so that the cost-benefit balance can be established.