Borderline and other mental disorders in alcoholic female psychiatric patients: a case control study.

A random sample of female, nonalcoholic psychiatric outpatients, day and inpatients from one catchment area (n = 65; C group), was compared with female psychiatric patients with a DSM-III alcohol disorder (n = 64; A group). On DSM-III, axis, I, the frequency of additional symptom diagnoses, including depressions, was nearly equal. On axis II, the A group had an additional personality disorder significantly more often (81 vs. 46%), borderline personality disorder being the most frequent (66 vs. 11%). Among patients with depressive disorders, the differences between the A and the C group on axis II were the same. But alcoholic patients suffering from a major depressive disorder more frequently had a borderline personality disorder than other subgroups. The alcohol problems seem to be more related to ongoing personality problems than to episodic, symptomatic disorders. Female psychiatric patients with alcohol problems are diagnostically a heterogeneous group and should not be offered a uniform therapy.