The 1977 Denver coroner's report found that 45% of all suicide victims received psychotherapy at some time, and 21% were in treatment at the time of death. The literature on suicide places all responsibility upon the therapist. Four major sources of variance deserving consideration, however, are patient variables, therapist variables, treatment…

Since the advent of institutional care in the nineteenth century, there has been extensive discussion concerning the relative merits and constraints inherent in such service provision. In the twentieth century, the trend toward institutionalization began to be reversed. Patients or clients were released or returned to communities and community…

This study investigated how persons of both sexes assess psychiatric patients' psychological functioning based on the consistency between the patient's sex and the "masculine" or "feminine" attitudes they express. No main effect for sex of judge or sex of patient was found; attitudes expressed by patients did effect maladjustment ratings.…

It is suggested that, although family practice generally has no subspecialties, such subspecialization need not cause a major distortion in the traditional role of the family physician. Data gathered from profiles of two "model" practices support the thesis. (LBH)

Multiple discriminant function analysis indicates that drug users see and want a treatment environment that allows open expression of feeling (spontaneity) and control (staff control). These apparently contradictory environmental dimensions define the dilemma in drug treatment, i.e., how to control drug use and simultaneously cope with drug users'…

This section describes hospice or palliative care programs for terminally ill patients and their families. The programs described are in Montreal, Quebec; Halifax, Nova Scotia; New Haven, Connecticut; Marin County, California; Tucson, Arizona; and Springfield, Illinois. (Author/JEL)

This article describes the experience of a nurse educator who participated in a one-month course in the care of dying patients at St. Christopher's Hospice in London. Emphasis is placed on the need for educators to become more aware of demands made on those caring for dying patients. (Author)

Need for a critical and analytical approach to ethics of terminal care is suggested by considering a series of unexamined questions regarding justification of terminal care. If terminal care is a moral and ethical enterprise, such considerations must be given a more prominent place in discussions of the hospice movement. (Author)

This article provides a descriptive overview of the legal problems that attend medical treatment of the terminally ill patient as well as a careful analysis of the legal vehicles that have been offered in response to these problems--the living will, the antidysthanasia contract, and right to die legislation. (Author)

In critically reviewing learned helplessness literature, P. H. Blaney (1977) has noted that most of the current support for this model rests on studies that induce or reduce helplessness in college student Ss. This research, employing a psychiatric population, addressed two issues Blaney suggested as in need of clarification: (1) the role of…

Illustrating modern community mental health philosophy, this article asserts that the term "client" is preferable to that of "patient" because it implies some measure of personal responsibility, does not carry the connotation of "mental patient", and is a respectable reference to those who patronize community mental health services. (JC)

This study was undertaken to extend the learned helplessness phenomenon to a clinical population and to test the competing hypotheses of Seligman and Lewinsohn. 96 male hospitalized psychiatric and medical patients were randomly assigned to one of four experimental conditions. Results replicate the learned helplessness phenomenon in a group of…

Teaching groups of patients is a part of nursing care, and microteaching is an instructional strategy which can promote process learning. Microteaching involves videotaping a segment of practice teaching experience with playback for student review. The article discusses theory and research related to microteaching and gives examples of its use.…

Though many states no longer prohibit the institutionalized mental patient from voting, it appears that many patients are not aware that they have this right. Discusses a plan implemented by the author, Vice-President of the Lehigh Valley Mental Health Association, Allentown, Pennsylvania, and a hospital committee to assist patients at a local…

The amount of recorded information from a medical interview by note-taking was compared with that received with no note-taking. The study with 46 medical students suggests that note-taking facilitates recall and that there is a progressive decay of memory recall with the passage of time between the physician-patient interview and the recording of…