“Mental Illness Awareness in Institutionalized Schizophrenics”

Abstract

Our study aimed to compare the mental illness awareness in institutionalized schizophrenics when compared to non institutionalized schizophrenics.Diagnoses of Schizophrenia was done following the ICD-10 dignosis criteria. We chose a convenience sample of our patients: 74 patients, 69.9% of institutionalized inpatients and a 31.1% of outpatients.Specific survey applied by the group of investigators aiming to collect socio-demographical data and clinical data, using the following psychometric scales: Scale to Assess Unawareness of Mental Disorder (SUMD), Global Assessment Scale (GAS), and Clinical Global Impression (CGI).Statistical analysis was performed with SPSS v 15.0, including descriptive statistics and correlation analysis.Differences found among awareness of response to medication and the awareness of social consequences of mental disorders are statistically significant, being higher in the institutionalized group of schizophrenics.