Psychosomatic education in Japan.

In the field of undergraduate education, there are eighty medical schools in Japan but only five of these have independent departments of psychosomatic medicine. Another seventeen schools have a curriculum including psychosomatic medicine. However, oriental psychotherapies such as fasting therapy, Naikan therapy and Morita therapy are taught in only a few schools. The postgraduate education is mainly promoted by the Japanese Psychosomatic Society which has about 1700 members including psychologists, nurses and social workers as well as medical doctors. The society has seven local branches throughout the country which hold one or two educational meetings per year as well as the Annual General Congress. Unfortunately, the growth of the Japanese psychosomatic movement has been fairly static over the last five years. The reasons are varied. Firstly, the Japanese economy has been affected by the recession and the Ministry of Education do not have the funds available to create any new psychosomatic departments in medical schools. The second reason lies with the general medical practitioners who fail to recognise the importance of psychosomatic medicine. In spite of such opposition our executive councillors are working hard to overcome these difficulties.