Counsellor training: An evaluation of the effectiveness of a residential outdoor pursuits activity weeked on the personal development of trainee counsellors

Trainee counsellors were taken on an outdoor development weekend training course, organised as a component of a two year part-time professional counsellor training course. The weekend was held during the final term of the second year of the course at an outdoor pursuits centre in the Lake District. The weekend's activities included canoeing, abseiling, onenteering, hill walking, rope work and climbing as well as other adventure exercises. Attendance at the weekend was compulsoy for all the 17 students on the course. This training weekend was an innovation in counsellor training and therefore a pilot study was designed to evaluate its effectiveness in making a contribution to the overall development of the trainees as counsellors. The study used a same subject experimental design and data was collected pre and post the weekend. The assessment procedure adopted for the purpose of this research included the use of repertoy grids and a series of questions with analogue scales for responses. There was some evidence to suggest that as a result of the weekend the participants experienced an increase in their self esteem, changes in their level of self confidence, felt more co-operative towards their fellow students, felt more helped by and helpful towards others and had an increased awareness of their competitiveness and stamina. It was concluded that the weekend made some contribution to the personal development of counsellors in training, particularly with regard to team building, co-operation and group cohesion.     

Psycho-analysis in the National Health Service General Hospital

SUMMARY

The paper describes the author's experience of practising psychotherapy based on psycho-analytic principles in three National Health Service Hospitals. Each is associated with a Post-Graduate institute. The Royal Marsden Hospital associated with the Institute of Oncology specialises in the treatment and study of cancer in all its forms in all ages. The Hammersmith Hospital is the site of the Royal Post-Graduate Medical School and it has an Obstetric and Gynaecology Unit which is part of the Institute of Obstetrics and Gynaecology. The Royal National Throat, Nose and Ear Hospital is a more compact specialist hospital associated with and containing the Institute of Laryngology and Otology.

In this paper instances are described where psychotherapy of Kleinian orientation has been helpful and has often been the only means of assisting patients by increasing their understanding and diminishing mental pain. The effects of introducing a psychotherapeutic rather than a psychiatric approach into the work of these departments is also described. The application of basic and fundamental analytic principles had a considerable advantage over the non-analytic psychological approach and was, in these circumstances, complementary to the one based on the medical/scientific model. This was particularly true of painful ‘terminal’ conditions. Liaison difficulties arise initially from the fact that medical and non-medical colleagues are commonly without experience of psychodynamic thinking and practice, and instead have many misconceptions about its nature and value. When the usefulness of the approach becomes evident to such colleagues prejudice gives way to understanding and co-operation. This has proved to be the most effective way of introducing analytically orientated psychotherapists and psycho-analytic thinking into the National Health Service, at the same time restoring to patients their dignity and supplying their needs as individuals for sensitive consideration and care.