Occasional Survey Hypothalamus as an Endocrine Organ * - II

units to university departments. We need, for example, one or two departments of forensic psychiatry to stimulate interest in the subject, to inquire scientifically into the problems, and to foster the required skills in new recruits to the field. Scotland has made a small beginning with a chair at Edinburgh University. England has no department of forensic psychiatry at all, though Professor Trevor Gibbens holds a personal chair at London University. It was not until 1973 that Britain acquired its first chair of child psychiatry. Criminology has begun to develop as an academic discipline in a few centres and is well ahead of forensic psychiatry. Psychologists are beginning to find a role in this widespread discipline as therapists, as advisers to prison managements, and all too infrequently as assessors of individual cases. There is no unit for forensic psychology in this country. Medical schools and universities provide the backbone, the nervous system for the whole of medical practice. Unless we are prepared to face the growing problems in the area where psychiatry and penology overlap, and are prepared to develop new clinical and academic facilities, the disasters will grow apace.