Roy Meadow first defined Munchausen by Proxy Syndrome (MBPS) in his 1977 paper "Munchausen Syndrome by Proxy – the hinterland of child abuse". He used it to describe the case of two children; one of who had suffered repetitive salt poisoning that later became fatal while the other underwent several investigative procedures for renal disease, which turned out to be fabricated by the mother. The cases seemed to correspond with Munchausen syndrome in that the children incurred many painful hospital procedures and admissions because of false stories and factitious signs but in these cases, the deception was not caused by the alleged patient themselves but by another person i.e. a proxy. This thus led to the term Munchausen by Proxy Syndrome. It is also known as Munchausen Syndrome by Proxy (MSBP) or Factitious Disorder by Proxy (FDP). By 1987, in a review by Rosenberg, the definition was listed as a syndrome cluster characterised by: -
             • Illness in a child that is faked or produced by a parent or caretaker
             • Persistent presentation of the child for medical assessment and care, usually resulting in several medical procedures
             • Denial of knowledge by the perpetrator of the cause of the illness in the child
             • Reduction in signs and symptoms of the alleged illness when the child is separated from the mother (Meadow, 2002).
             Schreier states that the essential aspect of the diagnosis of MBPS is the mother's (it is usually the mother in most cases) motivation to maintain a perverse relationship with the child's physician. He later goes on to suggest that the diagnosis should also extend to a mother's with a bizarre fixation not only with hospital personnel, but any powerful transferential figure(s) including law enforcement personnel, child protection workers, lawyers and school psychologists (Schreier, 1996). Many psychologists have addressed the use of the term MBPS. Some feel the ter...