[Termination of treatment in inpatient psychotherapy]

There are relatively few studies on the subject of dropping out of psychotherapy. This lead us to study before, during and after treatment all patients, who had been referred to our hospital for psychotherapeutical treatment over a time of one year. We compared a posteriori those patients, who had completed psychotherapy in our hospitalized setting in a regular fashion (n = 362) to those, who had dropped out (n = 43). It was found that the latter group showed (statistically significant) properties, which could be used to direct our attention to the danger of dropping out even before treatment. If our findings and first hypotheses concerning the reasons for dropping out of psychotherapy can be confirmed by future studies, we can derive from them relevant suggestions for the handling of this risky group of patients during treatment.