Psychiatric treatment of Roman Catholic religious patients: a pilot follow-up study

The pilot follow-up study reported here was undertaken to determine the treatment outcome of Roman Catholic religious priests, sisters, and brothers treated at The Menninger Clinic during a 10-year period. The authors stress the importance of involvement by the religious community in treatment and follow-up, and of opportunities in treatment to address spiritual and vocational issues. The extremely low response rate requires that the findings be regarded as tentative and as a pilot study for further research. However, the data do suggest some general conclusions for treatment of this population.