Qureshi N A, al-Habeeb T A, al-Ghamdy Y S, Magzoub M E, van der Molen H T
Buraidah Mental Health Hospital, Buraidah, Saudi Arabia.
East Mediterr Health J. 2001 May;7(3):492-501.
Psychiatric and physical morbidities among patients referred from primary health care (PHC) centres and general hospitals (GH) in Al-Qassim region were compared. Thus, 540 psychiatric referrals (GH = 138; PHC = 402) were selected randomly. Fifteen GH patients but no PHC patients were referred for admission. Psychiatrists made more diagnoses of dementia, affective and anxiety disorders, mixed anxiety-depression and somatoform disorders than clinicians and general practitioners (GPs). Clinicians made significantly more diagnoses of acute psychoses and somatoform disorders than GPs. Physical morbidity was noted in 38.4% and 17.2% of GH and PHC referrals respectively.
