• How people can access talking therapies as part of the national healthcare system, including a brief history of how this system has developed and the place of psychoanalytic psychotherapy inside/outside of this system historically • How clinicians train and qualify as a psychoanalytic practitioner, and demographic profiles of their communities of psychoanalytic practice • How evidence-based practice has impacted the mental health system and, in particular, access to and provision of talking therapies e.g. through the development and implementation of treatment guidelines • How outcome monitoring and reporting of access, waiting times and recovery rates are used in the commissioning and provision of psychological therapies • What is needed to secure a viable future for psychoanalytic psychotherapy The first of two volumes, this book will be of great interest to all practicing psychoanalysts and psychoanalytic psychotherapists. The chapters in these volumes were originally published as special issues of .