Balint Group Work with Medical Students
at St George’s, University of London Medical School
The Balint Group Student Selected Component (SSC) at SGUL was first piloted in the spring of 2016 following an initiative by Dr Caroline Reed-O’Connor (then, an SPR in Medical Psychotherapy and General Adult Psychiatry at St George’s), supported by Peter Schoenberg, at the time a member of the Royal College of Psychiatrist’s Student Psychotherapy Committee (a group who have been instrumental in establishing Balint group work in medical schools across the country).
Caroline moved to pastures new in November 2017 with the co-leadership of the group being enthusiastically picked up by Dr Ross Campion, now retired, but at the time a Child & Adolescent Psychiatrist and Group Analyst working in a specialist CAMHS unit based at Springfield Hospital, the operational site for South West London and St George’s Mental Health NHS Trust where the SSC has been conducted from the outset.
Intake for the SSC begins in August each year when T year students (first year clinical) are beginning to sign up to the various SSC offerings available. Given that we have now been running these groups for seven years, the word-of-mouth recommendations that we regularly receive usually means that we are very quickly over-subscribed (we know this from our intake questionnaire that students are asked to complete once allocated to a group). Students are taken on a first-come-first-served basis and allocated to one of the two groups we run, each comprising eight members. These groups run for twelve consecutive Thursday evenings during the autumn and winter terms (September to December and January to March).
As part of the SSC, students are expected to submit a 3,000-word reflective (nonacademic) essay describing their experience of being a member of the group. These are marked by us in the following summer term according to medical school guidelines. It is always illuminating to discover how students have been able to make sense of and assimilate their experience of what is essentially a rather countercultural endeavour in clinical medicine.
After completing each twelve-week group, students are canvassed for their feedback and encouraged to stay in contact with the Balint Society if their interest has been piqued. Some have done just that and have gone on to attend Balint Society events, including the Oxford residential weekend, where we now usually have one or two representatives from St George’s each year.
Apart from the evident importance of allowing medical students the opportunity to experience Balint group work early on in their training, this SSC has been an immensely satisfying, if sometimes challenging, project to be involved with as leaders. Working with such a diverse community of students and helping them to appreciate what can be achieved in a properly protected and well-run Balint group never fails to impress. Sometimes the learning has been remarkable, and occasionally, career defining for some of our students. That is always a great privilege to witness and be part of.
Perhaps an enduring regret is that there are a good number of students whom we cannot accommodate each year. The interest is clearly there, but the resources, not so bountiful. The availability of trained leaders and the limits of the teaching timetable are the current obstacles. Having said that, reaching over one hundred and twenty students in the past seven years is something that we are also rather proud of.
Eamonn Marshall
Psychotherapist, Clinical Supervisor and accredited Balint Group Leader
Dr Ross Campion
Group Analyst and accredited Balint Group Leader
November 2023