A COMPARATIVE OUTCOME STUDY OF PRELINGUAL LY DEAF AND HEARING LONG-TERM SCHIZOPHRENIC-PATIENTS

Prelingually deaf persons belonging to a linguistic and cultural minor ity have to cope with a particular sociocultural situation. The presen t study endeavours to analyse possible effects of this situation in th e course and outcome of schizophrenia. Two samples, one comprising 27 prelingually deaf and one 27 hearing patients, all with schizophrenic psychoses, were parallelised on the basis of gender, age, duration of illness and number of previous hospitalisations. Data were then collec ted on the premorbid and current social situation and on the psychopat hometric outcome after an (on the average) ten-year course. The prelin gually deaf patients were much more profoundly impaired with regard to the rating of their residual symptoms and their social situation than those of the hearing control group. Only with respect to vocational r ehabilitation did the prelingually deaf patients record a slightly mor e favourable situation than the hearing patients, as a greater proport ion of them had regular employment, in most cases in workshops for the disabled.