Fertility in psychiatric outpatients.

The fertility rates of 223 female schizophrenic outpatients and 479 female nonschizophrenic outpatients were compared to a probability sample of 300 women residing in the same geographic area, metropolitan Atlanta, and from the same social strata as the patients. Age- and race-adjusted comparisons showed that the mean number of children per woman and levels of unwanted and unplanned fertility did not differ in the different diagnostic groups. Furthermore, the rates were not lower for the psychiatric patients than for the general population. In order to reduce an important source of psychiatric morbidity, those in the mental health professions need to pay more attention to the family planning desires of their patients.