The Effect of Follow-up Contact in Reoccurrence of Psychiatric Readmission

This study examined if clinical contact with clients within one week of discharge from an inpatient psychiatric facility had an influence on their readmission. One of the factors explored in this study was whether the impact of clinical contact could reduce readmission rates after discharge used to develop intervention strategies to reduce readmission. The study found that those individuals who had a case management appointment set within the first seven days of discharge from an inpatient psychiatric facility was approximately eight times more likely than non-clinical referrals, 32 % vs. 4 %, to be not readmitted to an inpatient psychiatric facility. When this was examined even more closely, it was determined that case management appointments attended within the first day following discharge from an inpatient psychiatric facility was significantly associated with attendance following discharge. The number of individuals who attended case management appointments dropped approximately 50% within 24 hours of discharge, as compared with the number of individuals who attended appointments following two days after discharge (18 % to 8 %). This trend continued as time progressed for the first two to seven days following discharge from an inpatient psychiatric facility, where the attendance of a clinical appointment dropped to 4% within seven days following discharge. These findings have implications on what type of clinical contact should be pursued following discharge from an inpatient facility, and how soon that appointment should be accomplished in order to decrease readmissions.