A Questionnaire Follow-Up of Alcoholic Patients

Abstract

As a simple follow-up scheme, a direct questionnaire of 12 items was mailed to 270 of the 364 alcoholic patients discharged from a Cape Town hospital for alcoholics during the period March 1959 to August 1961. The patients had received intensive group psychotherapy in the hospital which was run on therapeutic community principles. After discharge all were advised to take disulfiram and were offered much help in social rehabilitation. The questionnaire was designed to be nonthreatening, to express interest, and to encourage relapsed patients to contact the hospital. Follow-up information was obtained from those who did not respond to the questionnaire by letter or telephone call to the patient, a relative or his doctor. Of the 270 patients, 94 (35%) completed and returned the questionnaire; 5 were women. Information was obtained about 135 of the nonresponders (18 women). Of the 94 responders, 74 were abstinent; and of the 135 nonresponders, 69 were abstinent. No relationship between abstinence and time since discharge was found. The incidence of abstinence was the same in men and women. For revealing prognostic factors, the 94 responders were compared with the 135 nonresponders and also with a control group of 94 nonrespondent patients consisting of the next new admission to the hospital following the admission of each responder. The age distribution, employment status and religious denomination of the responders and controls were similar. The responders included significantly more patients who were legally married on admission and who maintained an independent household than the controls. Among the responders, abstinence was not related to sex, occupational class, marital status or employment status on admission, or to the length of follow-up. Outcome was better in patients aged 45 years and over (55 abstinent, 16 drinking, vs. 19 and 3); those maintaining an independent household (55 abstinent, 9 drinking, vs. 19 and 10); and those not of the Dutch Reformed Church. Of those belonging to this church, 26 were abstinent and 11 drinking; Church of England, 17 and 2; other Protestant, 16 and 3; Roman Catholic, 9 and 2; Jewish, 1 and 1; other, 4 and 0.