100 randomly selected mildly or moderately mentally retarded adults were assessed for personality disorder using the Standardized Assessment of Personality devised by Mann et al. (1981). By the terms of this instrument 56% of patients showed features of abnormal personality, and in 22% this abnormality was marked, suggesting the presence of personality disorder. Personality problems may be a more significant factor in assessing a mentally retarded person's acceptability in a community setting than has hitherto been realized.

The utilization of psychotropic drugs is a topic of increasing interest. This paper describes a study of psychotropic drug use in two acute psychiatric in-patient services in Cremona, northern Italy. Almost all patients surveyed received one or more psychotropic drugs, and there was evidence of a substantial level of polypharmacy. Women patients were prescribed more psychotropic drugs than the men, while the relationship between drug prescription and psychiatric diagnosis differed between the two services. During the second phase of the study, the medical staff were aware that their prescribing was being monitored. However, this knowledge appeared to have little effect on their patterns of prescribing. The findings of Barton (1978) are thus not supported.

This paper examines the quality of care in four types of residence for mentally handicapped adults in Britain. Data were gathered from 175 residents of 150 living units – mental handicap hospital wards, voluntary and private homes, local authority hostels and parental homes. Differences were apparent between the types of residence in terms of both residents' characteristics and care practices and routines. The findings indicate that some of the differences in care practices are not associated with differences in the residents' functioning. Additionally, alternatives to hospital care for mentally handicapped people are not providing demonstrably improved quality of care in several aspects of residential practice. A discussion of those aspects of care calling for more improvement is presented.

Cochrane, in his studies of psychiatric admission rates amongst immigrant groups in Britain, allocated cases for which birthplace data was lacking by assuming that the patients were most likely to be British-born. A validation study shows this may not be justified. Estimates are made of the magnitude of the possible resulting error.