Lettre d'appui du Lacanian School of Psychoanalysis, Californie

February 18, 2025

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Monsieur Lionel Carmant
Ministre Responsable des Service Sociaux Québec

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Dear Minister Carmant,

We write to you as Board members of the Lacanian School of Psychoanalysis (LSP), a school engaged in the clinical training of psychoanalysts. Founded in 1990 in Berkeley, California, our membership is now international in its scope with members throughout North America, Europe, the Middle East, and Asia. The degree to which many of our psychoanalysts and trainees have been influenced by the work of the Freudian School of Quebec and The 388 cannot be overstated.

Since the Québec analysts first gave lectures at LSP in the 1990’s on a range of topics culminating in a three-day training on the treatment of psychosis, their work with people hearing voices and experiencing psychosis has produced results that have been transformational to the transmission of psychoanalysis within our School and to the private clinical practices and community mental health settings where our members treat patients.

From the perspective of this Board, the news that The 388 is currently facing the possibility of closure is tragic. Given the clinical importance of their interventions in psychoanalytic treatment, a treatment whose evidence is clear in the longitudinal studies and measures given in their published work, we view the closure of The 388 as a failure on the part of CIUSSS to provide equitable access to a treatment that delivers profound results that improve the lives of citizens of Québec.

Furthermore, the contributions to the clinical practice of psychoanalysis by The 388, especially with regard to the treatment of people with psychotic disorders, is of crucial importance not just to those individuals undergoing treatment there, but to the international community of psychoanalysts who seek to support people undergoing difficult mental and emotional experiences. 

We all know what it is to be listened to. When we tell an intimate truth to a spouse, partner or friend and come away feeling like the other person heard us, the result is often felt as a relief. We might exclaim, “it felt good to get that off my chest.” We were burdened before and now, thanks to our honesty and the listening ear of our friend, the burden has been lifted. Listening is, first and foremost, what psychoanalysis offers.

Too often,people who are deemed mentally ill, who experience extreme, often terrifying mental and emotional states, and who, as a result of these experiences, have difficulty coping in today’s world, are not given the basic dignity of being heard. Instead, they are labeled and given medication to dull and silence their symptoms. But, Freud argued that symptoms had a sense, and one that could be deciphered if they were listened to well enough. Psychoanalysis, unlike any other treatment, pays heed to this sense, and endeavors to listen where other therapies do not. Theresults of this endeavor are testament to the soundness of the theory and the effectiveness of the treatment offered at the 388.

For 42 years, The 388 has offered relief to these individuals. The treatment developed and provided there, based in psychoanalysis, has produced results seldom seen anywhere in the treatment of psychosis. Patients who enter having experienced isolation, estrangement from loved ones, homelessness or addiction as a result of their mental states, often leave having gained the ability to be productive, contributing members of society. These results reduce the social and financial costs associated with the ongoing destitution and homelessness often resulting from psychotic disorders, and reduce the cost of failed treatments that may have been provided elsewhere.

To close this treatment center is to ignore the evidence of its unusual success and undermine its legacy of training others to offer psychoanalytic treatment to underserved and vulnerable populations all over the world. As members of the Board of the Lacanian School of Psychoanalysis and as psychoanalysts, we urge you to reconsider your decision and make an ethical choice to keep the 388 open.

Respectfully,

ChristopherMeyer
PhD, PhD Psychoanalyst
Board President

Beatrice Patsalides Hofmann
PhD Psychoanalyst
Board Vice-President

Annie Rogers
PhD Psychoanalyst
Professor Emerita of Clinical Psychology
Hampshire College Board Officer

Marcelo Estrada
Psychoanalyst
Scholar and Founding Member of LSP
Board Officer

DianaCuello
PhD Psychoanalyst
Board Secretary

Nathan Lupo
LMFT Candidate Psychoanalyst
Board Officer

Garrett Tanner
PhD Candidate Psychoanalyst
Board Treasurer