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Treatment Patterns in Psychiatry: Clinical and Personality Features of Elderly Hospitalized Patients during Milieu, Single‐Drug and Multiple‐Drug Programs
Author(s) -
FRACCHIA JOHN,
SHEPPARD CHARLES,
MERLIS SIDNEY
Publication year - 1974
Publication title -
journal of the american geriatrics society
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.992
H-Index - 232
eISSN - 1532-5415
pISSN - 0002-8614
DOI - 10.1111/j.1532-5415.1974.tb01941.x
Subject(s) - medicine , drug , psychiatry , personality , anxiety , psychotropic drug , personality changes , personality disorders , drug treatment , clinical psychology , disease , psychology , social psychology
Psychologic tests and psychiatric ratings for 90 elderly long‐term psychiatric patients showed that those who were treated psychopharmacologically (one or more psychotropic drugs) had personality profiles indicative of less control of impulses and less anxiety binding than did those who received milieu (no‐drug) therapy. Since the three groups of elderly patients tested (no‐drug, one‐drug, multiple‐drugs) did not differ significantly from one another on all measures of intellectual functioning, emotional characteristics and individual psychiatric symptoms, it appears that treatment modes may be mediated more on the basis of reactive personality features than on the basis of clinical differences in basic pathology. Thus, although the patients treated with a single drug or multiple drugs did not manifest different symptom profiles qualitatively or quantitatively, when compared to patients who received no drugs they made their symptoms more apparent to the staff.