Countertransference in the general hospital setting: implications for clinical supervision

Psychiatry residents completing their consultation-liaison (CL) rotations are implicitly expected to recognize and consider countertransference reactions when offering clinical recommendations. Residents often lack formal guidance in this role, as there exists limited examination of clinical scenarios from a psychodynamic perspective. The authors present a historical review of the literature on countertransference with the medically ill and describe a clinical vignette illustrating the vicissitudes of liaison work. The case involves a psychotic patient with mental retardation and acute renal failure. Through refusal of care and a tumultuous clinical course, this patient elicited various countertransferential reactions from the primary care and CL teams, in turn adversely impacting treatment. The case illustrates how clinicians' failure to collaborate led to hospital administrators having to take on the liaison role. (1) A review of literature corroborates the importance of CL psychiatrists' assistance in the management of countertransference. At the same time, it is notable for a paucity of guidance in teaching these skills to psychiatry trainees. The psychiatry resident-in-training faces challenges and shortcomings in the management of countertransference. Formal training in this aspect of psychiatric consultation is lacking, as evidenced by extant publications. The authors propose future directions for research and teaching, with emphasis on clarifying the liaison component of CL psychiatry and advocating for establishment of psychodynamic psychotherapy training guidelines in the general hospital setting.