Personality traits and psychiatric rehospitalization: A two-year follow-up

This study followed 188 people with psychiatric impairments for 2 years after their discharge from a public psychiatric facility to assess the impact of personality traits on rehospitalization. A Cox regression analysis revealed a significant relation between the pattern of personality traits and psychiatric rehospitalization. The significant relation was retained after age, sex, race, education, Axis I diagnosis, subscale scores on the Brief Symptom Inventory, Methods of Coping Scale, Level of Expressed Emotion Scare, and scores on the alcohol and drug dependence scales of the MCMI-II were included in a stepwise inclusion analysis. The implications of these results for the assessment and treatment of people with psychiatric impairments are discussed.