Avoiding Mental Hospital Admission: A Follow-Up Study

Three hundred patients requiring immediate hospitalization were randomly assigned to outpatient family crisis therapy (FCT) or were admitted to a university psychiatric hospital. Post-treatment follow-up showed that patients treated without admission were less likey to be hospitalized after treatment and that their hospitalization was significantly shorter. At both six and 18 months, FCT patients were doing as well as the hospitalized patients on two measures of social adaptation and were managing crises more efficiently.