[Premorbid adjustment of 100 hospitalized adolescent patients]

Premorbid adjustment of 100 hospitalized adolescent patients and its correlation with some clinical variables was assessed and compared with a group of 100 healthy adolescents. The hospitalized group of patients was divided into four diagnostic subgroups according to the diagnostic criteria of ICD 9: psychoses, neuroses, conduct and personality disorders and anorexia nervosa. The following assessment tools were used: Premorbid Adjustment Scale in Polish adaptation of A. Grzywa, List of demographic variables, List of Organic Risk Factors, Inventory of Developmental Psychopathology and the Brief Psychiatric Research Scale (BPRS). SPSS was used to analyze the results. The results confirmed the hypothesis of different levels of premorbid adjustment in hospitalized and healthy adolescents as well as in hospitalized adolescents and original control group of the research of A. Grzywa. Contrary to our expectations and data from the literature premorbid adjustment was lowest in the group of patients with conduct disorders and not as was expected in the group of psychotic adolescents. It was also confirmed that the differences in the level of premorbid adjustment between the group of hospitalized adolescents and control groups were smaller in the period of early childhood than in later developmental periods. Pronounced difficulties in adjustment were observed in all diagnostic subgroups in the period of late adolescence.