Severe chronic illness and liaison psychiatry

The paper reviews three cases treated for somatic diseases on the clinical wards for dialysis, haematology and gynaecology. Patients suffereing from somatic diseases often have psychological disturbances, too. As a connection between somatic and psychological, a relatively new branch of psychiatry developed - liaison psychiatry. Liaison psychiatrist, on the one hand, halps the patient to cope with the illness more easily, and on the other hand, helps the members of the healing team to understand better the patient's psychological needs. In the described cases, psychological disturbances occurred at the end of somatic treatment. The liaison psychiatrist's role was to enable the patients to adapt to the new situation, and not to lose their quality of life. The aim of this paper is pointing out the importance of liaison psychiatrist in the treatment of physically ill patients.