Treatment dropout at a secondary mental health service

Abstract

OBJECTIVE: To investigate mental health dropout rates in secondary care and to identify possible associations between this variable and social, demographic, psychopathologic, and health care process-related variables. METHOD: This prospective, observational study included 994 patients referred to a secondary service by four primary care units and evaluated by a specialist mental health team between 2004 and 2008. The dependent variable was treatment dropout. Bivariate analyses investigated possible associations between treatment dropout and 57 independent variables. RESULTS: The overall dropout rate from specialist mental health treatment was relatively low (mean = 25.6%). Only four independent variables were associated with dropout: one socioeconomic, two psychopathological, and one health care process variable. All associations were marginally significant (p < 0.1). CONCLUSION: Our findings suggest that family members, patients, and health care professionals are well engaged in this mental health care system based on a model of primary care. The use of this mental health model of care should be extended to other regions of our country.

The role of the family in the psychiatric treatment dropout

“…The resulted data show that factors influencing psychiatric treatment dropout range from purely psychiatric to purely social, as well as overlaps between them (Osterberg and Blaschke, 2005). On the other hand, literature and studies in other countries sometimes provide different conclusions and also contradictory conclusions about dropout rates and predictors (Ribeiro et al, 2012), which may also indicate that in different cultures and conditions the evaluation of a situation should probably be started from different assumptions (Reneses et al, 2009). Data for this evaluation have been gathered only in one hospital.…”

El impacto del cuidado territorial en el tratamiento de personas diagnosticadas con esquizofrenia y trastornos delirantes en una comunidad en Río de Janeiro

“…2021;17:e3020. doi: 10.18294/sc.2021.3020 39,2% (43) ; 25,6% (44) , 37,6% (45) . La excepción fue Villeneuve et al (46) , que en su metaanálisis con 74 estudios, obtuvieron una tasa de abandono del tratamiento psicosocial entre pacientes diagnosticados con esquizofrenia del 13%.…”