Validity of a brief measure of post-hospital adjustment for psychiatric patients

This study examined the psychometric properties of a 14-item self-administe red outcome measure of posthospital adjustment for former psychiatric inpat ients. Such scales are frequently used in follow-up assessment, often witho ut knowledge of scale reliability or validity. Responses to the scale items were factor analyzed for two samples, former patients and their therapists , each group rating the patient's post-hospital adjustment. Two strong fact ors emerged and were consistent across both samples. an anxiety-depression (intrapsychic) dimension and a functioning/productivity (external adjustmen t) dimension. Both scales showed good convergent validity with longer, stan dardized measures. Agreement between patients and therapists was adequate f or anxiety-depression, indicating good consensual validity, but poor for fu nctional adjustment. For the expatients, discriminant validity was not evid ent. Copyright (C) 2001 by W.B. Saunders Company.