Am J Psychiatry 1982; 139:897-901
Copyright © 1982 by American Psychiatric Association
The acute administration ward as a therapeutic community
H Steiner, CV Haldipur and LC Stack
The authors evaluated six acute short-stay admission wards in a community
mental health center using the sociometric Ward Atmosphere Scale. There was
an attempt to run three of the six wards as therapeutic communities. No
differences were found on Ward Atmosphere Scale dimensions between the
therapeutic communities and other types of programs, nor did the
therapeutic communities conform to an empirically derived therapeutic
community program dimension profile. Possible reasons for this failure and
its implications for community mental health centers are discussed.
