Needs assessed by psychiatric health care and social services in a defined cohort of clients with mental disabilities.

Background: The identification of needs for support and service in clients with long-term mental disabilities is usually not done by staff personnel from both psychiatric care and social services. However, such a process is probably necessary in order to provide adequate psychiatric care and social services.

Aims: To estimate the prevalence of mentally disabled clients and investigate whether staff from psychiatric care and social services identified the same individuals and the same number of needs in the same areas.

Methods: Clients from a defined catchment area were identified during a three-month period. A questionnaire was developed to collect socio-demographic information and to assess needs for support and service.

Results: The study identified 1,290 clients with needs with a prevalence of 5.72/1000 inhabitants. More than half of the clients needed support in activities of daily living. Only 18.1% of the clients were identified by both organizations. In general, the staff from psychiatric care and social services identified the same needs at a group level. However, at the individual level, agreement was quite low.

Conclusions: The staffs from both psychiatric care and social services are necessary to evaluate the needs of support and services in clients with mental disabilities.