[Who are admitted to an adolescent psychiatric ward and why?]

The University Hospital's adolescent psychiatric ward is the first health service in Iceland exclusively intended for adolescents. The service was opened in order to meet the needs for a better treatment for adolescents with psychiatric disorders. The service was primarily intended for the most severely disordered who had to be admitted for hospital treatment. The paper shows the use of the unit during its first five years by studying the first 100 patients admitted. Slightly more girls than boys were admitted in the age range 11-19 years, the majority being 14-16 years of age, one half of the patients being 15 years or more. That group comprised a greater proportion with shorter stay, less than nine weeks. Almost one half of the group had conspicuous behaviour disorders at admission, and almost one third had shown suicidal behaviour or expressed having suicidal thoughts. Two thirds of the patients had been under a marked psychosocial stress according to a psychosocial stressor scale. The school and social situation of the majority was bad. One third of the patients were diagnosed as having mood or neurotic disorders according to ICD-10 and almost one half had behaviour or personality disorders. Adolescents with primarily behaviour or social problems, who needed longterm teaching and pedagogical support took up too much of the units resources. Therefore it was not possible to admit a number of patients with other disorders who needed treatment. This might be changed by more and improved outpatient service.