Am J Psychiatry 1981; 138:629-635
Copyright © 1981 by American Psychiatric Association
Unrecognized physical illness prompting psychiatric admission: a prospective study
RC Hall, ER Gardner, MK Popkin, AF Lecann and SK Stickney
The authors studied 100 state hospital psychiatric patients consecutively
admitted to a research ward who were screened to eliminate physical illness
before admission. They found an unusually high incidence of medical
illness: 46% of these patients had an unrecognized medical illness that
either caused or exacerbated their psychiatric illness, 80% had physical
illnesses requiring treatment, and 4% had precancerous conditions or
illnesses. A workup consisting of psychiatric and physical examination,
SMA-34, urinalysis, ECG, and EEG after sleep deprivation identified over
90% of medical illnesses present in this population. The authors suggest
that such a battery be part of the routine workup for all hospitalized
psychiatric patients.
