One-year follow-up of dual diagnosis patients attending a 4-month integrated inpatient treatment.

The purpose of this study was to assess a 4-month inpatient treatment program based on integrated models for patients with substance use and psychiatric disorders (dual diagnosis patients). On admission and at the 1-year follow-up, a consecutive sample of 118 dual diagnosis patients who entered the program were assessed by interview. Eighty-four patients (70.6%) completed the 1-year follow-up interview, reporting less frequent substance use, less severe psychiatric symptoms, a lower rehospitalization rate, and better housing conditions than on admission. Patients diagnosed with a comorbid personality disorder had a better improvement in the frequency of drinking and were less likely to be rehospitalized than patients with schizophrenia or depression. The results suggest that the integrated inpatient program may be a promising treatment approach for dual diagnosis patients. The results await replication in controlled studies that need to include an assessment of outpatient treatment following inpatient programs

The Lower Saxony research network design of environments for ageing : towards interdisciplinary research on information and communication technologies in ageing societies

Worldwide, ageing societies are bringing challenges for independent living and healthcare. Health-enabling technologies for pervasive healthcare and sensor-enhanced health information systems offer new opportunities for care. In order to identify, implement and assess such new information and communication technologies (ICT) the 'Lower Saxony Research Network Design of Environments for Ageing' (GAL) has been launched in 2008 as interdisciplinary research project. In this publication, we inform about the goals and structure of GAL, including first outcomes, as well as to discuss the potentials and possible barriers of such highly interdisciplinary research projects in the field of health-enabling technologies for pervasive healthcare. Although GAL's high interdisciplinarity at the beginning slowed down the speed of research progress, we can now work on problems, which can hardly be solved by one or few disciplines alone. Interdisciplinary research projects on ICT in ageing societies are needed and recommended