Objective
To identify characteristics of beginning and end of treatment of patients who dropped out of psychoanalytic psychotherapy (PP) at different times: between 2 and 11 months (middle dropout = MD) or with more than one year (late dropout = LD) from the beginning of psychotherapy.
Methods
Initial and post-treatment interviews of 14 adults (seven MD and seven LD) considered as dropouts by their therapists were analyzed using Bardin’s content analysis method.
Results
The analysis of initial interviews generated five categories (reason, goals, willingness to change, previous treatment, transference) and three post-treatment categories (process of change, evaluation of results, termination).
Conclusion
In comparison with LD patients, MD patients have more resistances, expected more support, showed less positive transferences, more depressive complaints and reported more negative experiences with previous treatments. The majority of MD patients began treatment by indication of others while most LD patients sought psychotherapy by themselves. In post-treatment interview, MD patients revealed more resistance during psychotherapy, showed less capacity for insight and made more negative evaluations of treatment, both in general and in specific ways. The differentiation MD and LD patients is tenuous and there is a need of more research on the subject.
Dropout; psychoanalytic psychotherapy; qualitative research