Alcoholism in Psychiatric Clinic Patients

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Abstract
In an intensive study of characteristics of all Maryland residents discharged from outpatient psychiatric clinics during the period 1 July-30 June 1959, data were collected on the symptom of excessive drinking. A minimum of 17% of the adult patients terminated during this period were excessive drinkers - 25.4% of the 2120 males and 8.8% of the 2270 females; more than half were diagnosed with a disorder not specific for alcoholism. The proportion of patients with excessive drinking was highest in those with personality disorders (26%), ranging from 0 to 14% in the other disorders. The combined rate of presumed problem drinkers per 100,000 population, constructed by adding the group with the symptom of excessive drinking and the group with disorders pertaining specifically to alcoholism, was more than twice as high in nonwhites as in whites and in males compared with females; the rates were also higher in Baltimore than in the rest of Maryland in each race-sex group. For both acute and chronic brain syndromes associated with alcohol intoxication and for alcoholism (addiction) the rates reached their peaks at earlier ages in nonwhites than in whites.

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