Demographic and clinical profile of patients utilising a transitional care intervention in the Western Cape, South Africa

Abstract

Background: The World Health Organization’s action plan for 2020 has identified the need for service-based data to motivate for more appropriate community-based services. To date, there is no published data from step-up or step-down facilities in South Africa.

Aim: To describe the demographic and clinical profile of all patients admitted to New Beginnings between 01 January 2011 and 31 December 2015.

Setting: New Beginnings is an intermediary care facility focused on psychosocial rehabilitation and accommodates 40 patients in a step-up or step-down setting.

Methods: In this retrospective audit, we reviewed the medical records of all patients (N = 730) admitted to New Beginnings between 01 January 2011 and 31 December 2015.

Results: Most admissions were male (n = 600; 82.2%), unmarried (92.1%) and unemployed (92.7%) patients with a mean age of 28 years. Only 20.7% had completed their schooling and 37.9% were receiving a disability grant. Most patients lived in the Cape Town Metro area (89%) with their families (94.7%), and 75.6% had no children. Schizophrenia (53.7%) was the most common primary psychiatric diagnosis, and most patients were on a combination of oral and depot treatment (46.8%). Illicit substances were used by 75.9% of patients with 30% using both cannabis and methamphetamine. Most patients (74.9%) had only one admission to New Beginnings.

Conclusions: These baseline data could inform improved service delivery. Further research is needed to evaluate the success of New Beginnings and highlight the need for more of these facilities in the Western Cape and across South Africa.