Objective: Next to socio-economic factors, subjective need, political and health economiaspects play an important role in the planning of psychiatric structures. The aim of this study was to assess the consequences of a reduction of inpatient capacities fort the usage of psychiatric inpatient care.
Methods: The admissions of inpatients from a region in which the inpatient service has been replaced by the inpatient service from another region in the canton of Zurich, Switzerland, has been analysed.
Results: Within the first two years after the omission of the service the admissions of patients with social health insurance policies from the relative sector decreased significantly as compared to the rest of the canton. In contrast to this, admissions of patients with private health insurances from the relative region and from the rest of the canton increased in a similar way.
Conclusion: It can be stated that in the first time after a reduction of inpatient capacities patients with social health insurance policies do not use inpatient alternatives even when these are easily accessible. This finding is meaningful for the arrangement of alternative offers for this very large group of patients in psychiatric health care planning.