The comparative effectiveness of community clinic and psychiatric hospital treatment

Explored in this study are the pre- and posttreatment differences in clients going to clinics and patients going to hospitals for treatment. As expected, clients were found to be better adjusted initially than their hospitalized counterparts, and both groups showed more improvement in symptoms than in their instrumental role functioning. Unexpected was the finding that hospitalized patients (especially females) showed more improvement than clinic clients, when the pretreatment adjustment differences between groups were controlled. This study supports a growing body of evidence indicating that hospital-based treatment is not necessarily less effective than treatment in the community.