Stephen M. Saravay, MD

The renaming of consultation-liaison psychiatry as psychosomaticmedicine, a new formal subspecialtyof psychiatry, may require someadjustment in our understanding ofthese terms. Both consultation-liaisonpsychiatry and psychosomatic medicinehave focused on treatment and researchof illnesses with mind-body interactions.Despite considerable overlap,consultation-liaison psychiatry hastraditionally been associated with treatmentand clinical research of comorbidmental disorders of the medicallyill, while psychosomatic medicine hasbeen associated with research into thephysiologic mechanisms underlyingmind-body interactions and classicalpsychosomatic diseases such as hypertension,asthma, and ulcerative colitis.