Prediction of short-term outcome in newly admitted psychogeriatric patients

Thirty-six consecutive admissions to a geriatric service recently reorganized to function within a community psychiatric framework were evaluated by means of a series of behavioral and psychologic measures. Assessments upon admission and at three, five and eight weeks and five months afterward, revealed that the greatest therapeutic responses and the most discharges occurred within the first few weeks after admission. Patients remaining for longer periods tended to stabilize at a lower level of functioning or to deteriorate. A combination of two simple measures used in evaluation upon admission and relating to physical and mental functioning was found to predict the patient's status at five months (still in the hospital, dead, or discharged) with 75 percent accuracy. Use of the lambda statistic for judging the predictive power of measures is suggested.