Franco De Masi is a psychiatrist and psychoanalyst by training and supervision of the Italian Psychoanalytic Society and former president of the Centro Milanese di Psicoanalisi. He worked for twenty years in Italian psychiatric hospitals and currently works as a full-time psychoanalyst in Milan. His main interests are focused on the theoretical and technical questions of psychoanalysis related to the seriously ill patient. He is the author and editor of numerous books, including La perversione sado-masochistica (1999), Vulnerabilità alla psicosi (2006), Lavorare con i pazienti difficili (2012) and Psicopatologia e Psicoanalisi Clinica (2016).