ABSTRACT
Henderson Hospital is a democratic therapeutic community based in South London. It was set up in 1947 by Dr Maxwell Jones, one of the pioneers of therapeutic community developments within the United Kingdom. Social criteria of successful treatment include clinical improvement, employment, reconviction, and readmission to psychiatric facilities. A small-scale outcome study was incorporated, however, and the findings suggested that the democratic therapeutic community method was not universally applicable, that some selection process for patients was necessary, and that the intensive social and interpersonal pressures could damage those with weak ego structures. Rapoport had also pointed out a conflict of aims between those of the therapeutic staff and those of the workshop instructors who were aiming for “rehabilitation”. Reconviction and readmission to psychiatric facilities are often used as outcomes but are only indirect measures of psychological health.
