Trends in emergency psychiatry in the last two decades

Abstract

Emergency psychiatric services provide essential care. Their use may also be assumed to reflect the health care needs of a population. Trends were observed in an emergency psychiatric service over a 17 yr period by comparing 400 randomly selected patient visits in 1977 with data from 1960 and 1970. A decrease in the number of patients seeking treatment, decreased patient age and socioeconomic status, increased use by men, increased night visits, little change in diagnostic categories and a striking increase in hospitalization since 1970 were found. These data support the importance of assessing trends in emergency psychiatric services over time to ensure that they meet the needs of the population being served.