Parental deprivation due to death in male soldiers with psychiatric disorders.
BACKGROUND
The importance of early relationship with parents has been stressed by most personality theorists. Deprivation of the nurturing influence can lead to an adverse impact.


OBJECTIVE
To study the effect of early parental loss in the development of adult psychiatric disorder.


METHODS
A total of 289 soldiers suffering from assorted ICD-10 identified psychiatric disorders were studied to ascertain parental losses during their developmental period. The findings were compared with those of 127 patients drawn from general medical wards.


RESULTS
A higher percentage of psychiatric patients had lost their parents before the age of 18 years compared with medical patients (21.5% vs. 8.7%). The difference, which was highly significant, was due to bipolar disorder to some extent and alcohol dependence syndrome to a larger extent. Loss of the father appears to be more significant than loss of the mother. Parental loss is found to be not a significant factor in depression and neurotic disorders. There is no excess of maternal loss in cases of depression.


CONCLUSIONS
This study indicates that parental loss is a significant factor in the future development of psychiatric disorders. It does not appear to be an important factor in the development of neurotic disorders. The aspect requires comprehensive evaluation.
Kama Raju
M S V
MS
Commandant and Professor of Psychiatry, Military Hospital, Kirkee, Pune.
Srivastava
Kalpana
K
Diwakar
M
M
Bhat
P S
PS