Sharing Psychiatric Care with Primary Care Physicians: The Toronto Doctors Hospital Experience (1991–1995)

Abstract

Objectives: To investigate the shared mental health care experience of the psychiatry department of a small urban general hospital, which serves an ethnoculturally diverse population. Methods: A chart survey was undertaken of all patients referred by community physicians to a new shared care program between January 1991 and December 1995. Selected demographic and diagnostic characteristics were collected and analyzed. Results: Seven hundred and thirteen patients were assessed. They were principally female, ethnoculturally varied, and highly comorbid. The most striking association involved mood and substance-related disorders. Conclusion: The Doctors Hospital experience shows that the shared care approach can reach large numbers of patients through a multiplier effect. Additionally, this approach has the potential to enhance access for ethnoculturally varied and diagnostically complex groups.