[Encounter as therapy].

What are the typical aspects of a therapeutic relation, how does it develop and in what manner might it influence the therapeutic result? Encounter as therapy may open the chance to initiate self regulating forces that seem to be blocked by the 'disease'. The term 'disease' implicates the term 'therapy'. A real encounter demands trust and responsibility, unselfishness and readiness for risks from all persons involved (physicians and/or therapists as well as patients). The opposite terms, lack of trust, lack of responsibility, selfishness and lacking readiness for a risk mark the other side of the encounter, of the process of interaction. Encounter or the process of interaction always take place in time and space while persons define a situation. Rules and roles, patterns and exceptions are further structural characteristics of a situation.