Characteristics of children admitted to inpatient community mental health center
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Archives of General Psychiatry
|April 1, 1983
Insights
Multiple factors, not just one, contribute to pediatric inpatient admission. These include initial symptoms, diagnoses, and family issues, impacting community mental health center services.
Area of Science:
- Child and Adolescent Psychiatry
- Mental Health Services Research
- Clinical Psychology
Background:
- Pediatric mental health services often involve inpatient and outpatient care.
- Understanding factors leading to inpatient admission is crucial for resource allocation and treatment planning.
Purpose of the Study:
- To compare children admitted to an inpatient service with a matched outpatient control group.
- To identify the combination of factors differentiating these two groups.
Main Methods:
- A comparative study involving 100 inpatient children and 100 matched outpatient children (aged 7-12 years).
- Analysis of initial symptoms, diagnoses (DSM-III, axes I, II, III), and family factors.
Main Results:
- Inpatient admission was associated with a combination of factors, not a single cause.
- Key differentiating factors included variations in initial symptoms, diagnostic profiles across multiple axes, and family circumstances.
Conclusions:
- Pediatric inpatient admission is multifactorial.
- Clinical and family assessments are essential for differentiating inpatient and outpatient needs in children.
Abstract:
Comparison of 100 children, aged 7 to 12 years, admitted to an inpatient service of a community mental health center (CMHC) with a matched control group of 100 children from the outpatient department of the same CMHC showed that a combination of several factors (rather than a single factor) led to inpatient admission. These factors included differences in Initial symptoms, diagnosis in DSM-III, axes I, II, and III, and family factors.