ABSTRACT
In previous chapters we have analysed the functioning of the Unit in some detail, and examined a cross-section of patients’ careers. We found, with reference to families, that on the whole married patients, especially males, did better in the Unit than did others. However, we noted that ‘improvement’ as rated in the Unit is not necessarily correlated with ‘improvement’ six months following discharge: there was a decrease in the percentages of people helped in any discernible way by their Unit experience. Assuming a reasonable degree of observer reliability in the two sets of ratings, we are still left with the question as to whether post-discharge setbacks were due to the irrelevance of socialization in the Unit (‘improvement’) for life outside, to the temporary remission of illness in the Unit’s sheltered circumstances, or to factors in the family (or elsewhere) that worked to undo any benefit from the experience in the Unit. However that may be, it was also found that married patients managed after a year to recover their improved level of functioning in larger proportions than other patients, suggesting either superior regenerative powers in family relations, or alternatively superior personal adaptive capacity in patients who had married. (On the whole the married group contained large proportions of patients categorized with strong-ego, who in any case tended to do well). In the present chapter we shall examine some of the characteristics of the family life of patients so that a deeper understanding can be derived of the therapeutic implications of a patient’s being ‘married’ or ‘living with parents’.
