Patient characteristics and perceptions of the mental hospital milieu

✍ Scribed by Ira Friedman; Albert F. Paolino; Edward N. Hinko; John R. Graham; Roy R. Lilly

• Publisher: John Wiley and Sons
• Year: 1974
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 375 KB
• Volume: 2
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0090-4392
• DOI: 10.1002/1520-6629(197404)2:2<148::aid-jcop2290020214>3.0.co;2-1

✦ Synopsis

PROBLEM

In the past two decades, the concept of the therapeutic milieu has had a considerable impact on treatment programs in most inpatient psychiatric facilities. Most efforts to create a therapeutic milieu have involved stating desirable characteristics, usually based on the theoretical notions of writers such as Schwarts(') and Jonesc6), and assuming that these characteristics would be translated into meaningful aspects of the treatment program.

Inherent in such an approach is the assumption that all patients in a treatment unit will perceive the treatment program in the same way. Clinical experience suggests, however, that this might not be the case. Patients on the same ward often describe the environment in quite different ways. It is difficult to know, of course, whether patients are distorting reality to fit in with their own needs or whether different kinds of patients elicit different reactions from stafT with these differences being reflected accurately in the patient perceptions. This study attempted to delineate more clearly the relationship between a variety of patient characteristics and patient perceptions of the treatment milieu.