Objectives: Monitoring and evaluating the Italian psychiatric hospitals closure process, stated by the law to be concluded by 31 December 1996, and then postponed to 31 March 1998, identifying characteristics related to the possibility of discharge in 4493 patients living in twenty-two public psychiatric hospitals.
Method: Sociodemographic and clinical data, information on impairment and functioning and plans for discharge in the subsequent twelve months of all patients were collected at baseline using a standard questionnaire.
Results: Discharge was planned within twelve months for 11% of the patients: 4% to other psychiatric or non-psychiatric institutions and 7% to community settings. Severely disabled patients and patients with some behavioural problems were more frequently scheduled to go to institutional settings. For both types of discharge, an adequate network of social relationships was an important determinant. Patients were more frequently planned for discharge if they resided in hospitals with a higher care providers/patients ratio, and in Emilia Romagna and Rome, than in Lombardy and Liguria.
Conclusion: Frequency of planned discharge depended partly on the patients' personal characteristics related to independence and functioning, but the effect of these factors on frequency of planned discharge was influenced by characteristics of the hospitals where the patients lived.