An examination of the temporal and geographical patterns of psychiatric emergency service use by multiple visit patients as a means for their early detection

Table 4 Relationship between cluster frequency and diagnosis^a for two cohorts^b of selected multiple visit patients.

	Personality disorders		Bipolar disorders		Subs. abuse disorders		Schizophrenia		Other disorders		Patients^c (visits)
Cohort	a	b	a	b	a	b	a	b	a	b	a	b
No clusters	31	21^d	71	30	40	14	131	75	24	9	297	149
	(341)	(453)	(840)	(619)	(458)	(262)	(1687)	(1519)	(250)	(152)	(3576)	(3005)
1 to 3 clusters	50	17	31	5	38	12	63	24	24	4	206	62
	(875)	(473)	(535)	(111)	(499)	(281)	(1101)	(772)	(303)	(79)	(3313)	(1716)
≥ 4 clusters	14	9	3	2	7	1	23	8	1	0	48	20
	(771)	(603)	(179)	(149)	(180)	(29)	(1106)	(500)	(26)	0	(2262)	(1281)
Total patients	95	47	105	37	85	27	217	107	49	13	551	231
(Total visits)	(1987)	(1529)	(1554)	(879)	(1137)	(572)	(3894)	(2791)	(579)	(231)	(9151)	(6002)

^a Other = adjustment disorders, depression, anxiety disorders, organic mental disorders, psychosis not otherwise specified, paranoid psychoses.
^b Cohort a = repeating clusters (4 visits in 3 months) in patients with 8 or more visits taken from the intermediate and heavy user groups. Cohort b = repeating clusters (7 visits in 6 months) in patients with 14 or more visits taken from the heavy user group.
^c N values = 551 (of the 631 cohort a patients) and 231 (of the 247 cohort b patients) are patients that had a clear diagnosis.
^d The numbers above the parentheses represent the patient count, the numbers in the parenthesis represent the corresponding number of visits.

ISSN: 1471-244X