Psychiatrically hospitalized adolescents from city and voluntary
services who had been diagnosed as having conduct disorder were compared
with psychiatrically hospitalized adolescents who had never been so
diagnosed. There were no significant symptomatic differences. The major
factor distinguishing adolescents ever diagnosed as having conduct disorder
was violence, regardless of other symptoms. The most common discharge
diagnosis of those who had formerly been diagnosed as having conduct
disorder was schizophrenia. However, even violence did not distinguish
those discharged with a diagnosis of conduct disorder from those whose
diagnoses were subsequently changed. With its focus on manifest behaviors
and its lack of clear exclusionary criteria, the conduct disorder diagnosis
obfuscates other potentially treatable neuropsychiatric disorders.
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