Community characteristics that affect hospitalization and rehospitalization rates in a municipal psychiatric hospital.
Age-specific rates of psychiatric admissions for Brooklyn are almost exclusively explained by socioeconomic measures. A measure of interpersonal contact explains an additional small increment of the variance. When the same age-specific rates are compared for whites and blacks, the relative importance of socioeconomic measures lessens and social and family structures emerge as significant predictors. The existence of unique ethnic-related factors as intervening variables in hospital admissions is strongly suggested by the data. A measure of interpersonal contact best predicts the percentage readmitted. In contrast the percentage admitted is strongly related to social and family structure measures.
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D003710:Demography; D005006:Ethnicity; D005260:Female; D006760:Hospitalization; D006778:Hospitals, Psychiatric / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009519:New York City; D010343:Patient Admission; D010359:Patient Readmission; D012931:Social Environment; D012959:Socioeconomic Factors