Bereavement and psychiatric hospitalization.

Two hundred forty-nine psychiatric inpatients were compared with 249 matched controls and with a psychiatric hospital survey group of 95 patients for incidence of recent bereavement. There were no significant differences between the groups for loss of a first-degree relative in six months and one year prior to admission. There was a preponderance of affective disorder among the psychiatric patients with recent loss. Severe subjective grief reactions were found in the four patients who had lost a spouse or a child and in some patients who had lost a parent, while loss of a sibling usually evoked a mild reaction. Patients with alcoholism tended to increase their drinking during the bereavement period, resulting in incapacitation and hospitalization or, in the case of a control patient, in severe trauma.