[Pediatric psychosomatic medicine. Liminal proposals]

Psychosomatic disorders are part of the pediatrician's everyday practice. However, they have only lately become a field for systematic investigations, based on diverse methods and concepts. The viewpoints supported by the authors originate in studies carried out in the pediatric department of a hospital which deals only with psychosomatics. The following points are considered successively: 1) definition and peculiarities of psychosomatic disorders in children; 2) susceptible emotional organizations, which carry a high risk of psychosomatic disease; 3) depression, which is a key mental mechanism in psychosomatic disruption. One of the main purposes of research is description of a specific semiology of childhood psychosomatic disease. Its ambition is to be both open to medical practice and acknowledged in its specificity, so as to be used in psychological disciplines, i.e., sufficiently clear but without oversimplification. Further developments can be found in "L'enfant du désordre psychosomatique" (Privat 1981) and "La psychosomatique de l'enfant" (PUF 1983).