Training for Battle: Thoughts on Managing Aggressive Patients in state hospitals. References 1. Baasher T: On vagrancy and psychosis. Community Mental Health Journal

iions for mental health policy and prac-tice. Presented at the annual meeting of the American Psychological Associ-882 August 1987 Vol. 38 No. 8 Hospital and Community Psychiatry The patients in the study were less likely to be diagnosed as schizophrenic than patients in the total state hospital population, and the reasons for their admissions were less severe. Many of these patients had received services from community mental health agencies but felt that these services were not helpful. The results suggest that most of the patients in our study had not chosen a transient, wandering life-style. Instead, more than 70 per-cent initially became homeless be-cause of family break-up, rejec-tion, or a crisis situation. These subjects indicated a willingness to accept help and an ability to for-mulate some concrete and realistic future living plans. Thus although the homeless and potentially homeless constituted less than 10 percent of hospital admissions during the study pen-od, their problem histories and substantial use of resources mdi-cate that they should be a popula-tion of concern. Furthermore, their hospitalization may be due more to their lack of a residence than to the acute or severe nature of their symptoms. The challenge for service providers will be to devise community programs that address the multiple problems of the homeless and are more accept-able to them than traditional men-tal health services. The group studied is only one segment of the homeless: those with mental health problems that are visible enough to require their hospitalization. It is unclear what percentage of the larger homeless population is included in this group. It is hoped that this study will bring attention to the special needs of the homeless mentally il