[Primal therapy--a clinically confirmed procedure?].

In two legal findings, the courts had to decide whether medical insurance would pay for so-called primal therapy. The courts requested an evaluation as to whether primal therapy is recognized as a scientific therapeutic process. The authors examined the available literature and then came to the conclusion that primal therapy is not a valid therapeutic technique. They further emphasized that primal therapy is not a type of psychoanalytic therapy. In point of fact, primal therapy has seldom been discussed in the scientific psychotherapeutic literature. That is to say, there are no on-going reports of primal therapy's therapeutic results, no statistical studies and no follow-up studies. Most psychotherapists in the Federal Republic of Germany do not utilize so-called primal therapeutic processes, perceiving it as based on questionable theoretical premises and dangerous in practice. Finally, the authors question the efficacy of primal therapy and especially its use by laymen.