A behavioral comparison of female adolescent inpatients with and without borderline personality disorder

Patients with borderline personality disorder (BPD) are thought to have pro blematic hospitalizations. This study seeks to examine this phenomenon in a dolescence by documenting the specific problem behaviors exhibited by patie nts, and the staff interventions in response to these behaviors in patients with and without BPD. Data were collected from the charts of 81 hospitaliz ed adolescent girls regarding restraints, seclusions, incidents of self-abu se and aggression, incidents of signing the intent-to-leave form, nonroutin e drug and/or alcohol screens, and discharges against medical advice. The t wo groups were compared using the analysis of variance (ANOVA) statistic fo r continuous variables and the chi-square statistic for the categorical var iable. A follow-up multivariate ANOVA (MANOVA) was performed using the leng th of stay as a covariate. The BPD group displayed significantly higher rat es of certain behaviors per day, but not of others. The length of stay was significantly higher in the BPD group. Further analysis indicated that some of the behavioral differences between the two groups may be due to the eff ect of the difference in length of stay. The data also suggest that while m ost BPD patients behave similarly to other patients, there may be a subset of BPD patients who behave in an extreme manner while hospitalized. BPD pat ients may display more of certain problematic behaviors than non-BPD patien ts in the hospital. However, it is hypothesized that these differences in h ospital behavior may be largely due to the different lengths of stay betwee n the two groups or to an acting-out subgroup of BPD patients. Copyright (C ) 1999 by W.B. Saunders Company.