The relevance of psychoanalytic ideas to crisis work

The therapeutic aim of crisis work typically has been to help the patient r egain a pre-morbid state of functioning with an almost exclusive focus on t he amelioration of immediate symptomatology. Drawing on our experience in a crisis team of a major metropolitan hospital with a large Hispanic and Afr ican-American population, we contend that crisis work ought not to focus my opically oil symptom removal and must include, to the highest degree possib le, an exploration of the multiple meanings contained in what is possibly a turning point in the patient's life. Toward this aim, wc describe three ps ychoanalytic principles believed to be particularly relevant to crisis work that have, nonetheless, traditionally been deemed inappropriate for this t reatment modality. These principles are historicity, neutrality, and fantas y. Discussion of the principles are presented within the context of case ma terial.