[Integration and reintegration of first admission psychiatric patients]

In the framework of a prospective follow-up study, development and outcome of the occupational and social status in 258 first-admission psychiatric patients was investigated. Interviews were made at the time of discharge, 1 year and 5 years later. For that reason prospective data exist on the prehospital and hospital time as well as on short-term and long-term course. Social adjustment, occupational rehabilitation, early retirement, social status and pre- and post-hospital occupational integration were investigated. It must be placed on record, that psychiatric patients are subjected to severe negative changes in their occupational and social life even after the first hospital treatment. Type and quantity of disintegration depended on the diagnostic group. Schizophrenic patients differed from the other patients in every intergration area.