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Edited by Michael Blumenfield and James J. Strain, 949 pp (includes DVD), $199.
Philadelphia, Pa, Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, 2006.
ISBN-13 978-0-7817-6046-1.

JAMA. 2007;297:1827-1828.

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text and any section headings.

Psychosomatic medicine was recently granted a psychiatric subspecialty status by the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology. Its first board examination was subsequently completed in 2005. Although it is unlikely that many nonpsychiatrist physicians have heard of this subspecialty, older physicians may remember that at one time psychosomatic medicine promised to explain the etiology and pathogenesis of such poorly understood illnesses as peptic ulcer disease and rheumatoid arthritis. Broadly speaking, psychosomatic medicine studies the 2-way interaction of mind and body in human function and illness. Whereas psychosomatic research attempts to discern how mental processes can produce somatic changes, clinical psychosomatic medicine (often called consultation-liaison psychiatry) focuses on the management of patients with comorbid medical and psychiatric illnesses. Many would consider psychosomatic illnesses to be those conditions without a seemingly straightforward medical basis, such as conversion disorders, chronic fatigue syndrome, irritable bowel syndrome, and fibromyalgia. Along with these types of disorders, . . . [Full Text of this Article]

J. Robert Swenson, MD, FRCPC, Reviewer
Department of Psychiatry
University of Ottawa
Ottawa, Ontario
jrswenson@ottawahospital.on.ca