Review panels for involuntary psychiatric patients: which patients apply?

This study attempted to identify which involuntary patients apply to Review Panels for discharge. Four hundred and eighty-seven (487) patients who applied for review at a provincial mental hospital during a five-year period were compared, on 27 variables, with 2,966 patients who, although eligible to apply, chose not to do so. The groups differed on nineteen of the twenty-seven variables. Discriminant analysis was used to identify the ten best predictors of who will apply to the Review Panel. The profile thus derived of the Review Panel applicant, may be useful to management teams who could try to formulate a plan that would reduce the probability that the patient will apply.