Cross-National Study of Diagnosis of the Mental Disorders: Some Results from the First Comparative Investigation

Consecutive admissions to a U. S. state hospital and to an English area mental hospital were compared to investigate the source of observed differences between the two countries in the frequencies of diagnoses given to hospitalized patients. Although independently assigned project diagnoses for the two series resembled one another in frequency more so than did the two sets of official hospital diagnoses, indicating national differences in the use of diagnostic terms, the authors conclude that there were genuine clinical differences between the patient populations as well.