Adolescent Admissions in Psychiatry: Reconsidering Clinical and Institutional Parameters on the Occasion of a Report of a Greek Experience

More than half a century since the creation of the first specialized units in the USA and the U.K., inpatient treatment of adolescents remains an illustrative example of the difficulties in integrating adolescent services in mental health care systems. Through a literature review, the various parameters of adolescent hospitalization in psychiatry are examined. Among the different “solutions”, admission to general (adult) psychiatry remains a realistic option, as long as the gap between child and adult psychiatry perpetuates the difficulties of older and post-adolescents in having access to inpatient treatment facilities. The report of an experience from Northern Greece of 253 admissions in a general psychiatric ward at a university general hospital gives the authors of this paper the opportunity for a discussion on this particular practice, and for reconsidering the main questions on adolescent hospitalization in general.