Garth Wood; Writer Questioned the Value of Psychotherapy
Garth Wood, 57, a British psychiatrist who wrote a controversial book questioning the benefits of psychotherapy, died in late April in London, apparently of a heart attack.
In his book “The Myth of Neurosis: Overcoming the Illness Excuse” released in the United States in 1986, Wood argued that many patients would receive as much benefit from facing up to their problems as they would from being in therapy.
He described as “absolute fallacy,” what other psychiatrists defined as mild to moderate mental disorders: anxiety, depression, compulsions and phobias.
“I disavow and disallow the concept of neurosis,” Wood said in a Washington Post interview.
Born in Hampshire, England, Wood studied psychiatry at Cambridge and was married to model-turned-novelist Pat Booth.
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