'Sopranos' doc's actions raise eyebrows

NEW YORK, June 7 (UPI) -- When fictional shrink Dr. Jennifer Melfi dropped Tony Soprano once a colleague told others about the mobster, real therapists in the United States were angry.

"There were two issues in the last episode: the breach of confidentiality and the abandonment," said Dr. Dorothy Cantor, former president of the American Psychological Association and a practicing psychologist in Tony Soprano's "home state" of New Jersey. "They were both wrong."

"Confidentiality," Cantor told ABC News, "is the backbone of what therapists do."

Throughout the seven seasons of "The Sopranos," the mobster's relationship with Lorraine Bracco's Melfi was the one constant in his life. When she unexpectedly dropped him, James Gandolfini's Soprano accused her of being "immoral." Therapists who had praised the accuracy of the doctor-patient relationship agreed.

When therapists discuss patients with colleagues, they make a point "not to breach confidentiality. When talking or publishing, therapists make an effort not use names and to disguise the identities of their clients," Cantor told ABC.

As for her abrupt termination, "There is an old canard that an analyst should give a client one month for every year of therapy," said Bruce Hillowe, a psychologist and lawyer.

"The Sopranos" series finale on HBO is Sunday.