Pre-registration house officer training in psychiatry

I was struck by Rebecca Mason's claim (Psychiatric Bulletin, October 2003, 27, 394-395) that, in 1981, she was involved in one of the first pre-registration house officer posts in psychiatry in this country. In fact, in 1960, at the Sefton General Hospital in Liverpool, I held the post of pre-registration house physician in psychiatry for 9 months. Next, I moved to Walton Hospital, also in Liverpool, where I was a pre-registration house surgeon in neurosurgery and following this, in the same hospital, I held the post of senior house officer in neurology. From then on, I did nothing but psychiatry. I have never held a general medical or a general surgical post and I have never regretted this. Even as an undergraduate, I was passionately interested in psychiatry, and I took every opportunity that came my way to gain additional experience in it. I have always held the view that psychiatry is a profession in its own right, and that its true foundations are psychology and neurology. Psychiatry is becoming ever more influenced by these two areas of study, and we should be directing prospective psychiatrists towards them and away from general medicine.