INPATIENT PSYCHOTHERAPY OF ANXIETY DISORD ERS - A COMPARISON OF ITS EFFECTIVENESS ON PATIENTS WITH GENERALIZED ANXIETY DISORDER, AGORAPHOBIA AND PANIC DISORDER

We investigated the effect of psychoanalytically oriented inpatient ps ychotherapy on three essential forms of anxiety disorders (classified according ICD-10): 1. generalized anxiety disorder (n = 23), agoraphob ia (n = 38) and panic disorder (n = 24). Examinations with psychometri c test instruments were performed at beginning of inpatient psychother apy, at dismissal and 6 weeks after dismissal. At the end of inpatient psychotherapy we judged four clinically relevant criteria of therapy success: at the one side the therapist's judgement of symptomatic and structural improvement of the patients, at the other side the patients ' judgement of anxiety and depression diminuation. The results demonst rate that suming up these four success criteria 1.) 40.0 % of the pati ents with anxiety disorders improved, 21.2 % failed; 2.) 61,4 % of the patients with agoraphobia improved, 6.3 % failed and 3.) 52.5 % of th e patients with panic disorder improved, 6.5 % failed. An additional a nalysis of these results showed that the patients with generalized anx iety disorder were significantly (p < 0.01) more disturbed (according clinical assessment) compared to the other two diagnostic groups. Abou t 60 % of these patients exhibited increased anxiety symptoms during t he course of inpatients psychotherapy, nevertheless relative to the ot her success criteria these patients achieved satisfactory outcome resu lts. In the paper the consequences of these findings are discussed esp ecially for inpatient psychotherapy of severely disturbed patients wit h anxiety disorders.