OBJECTIVE: To investigate the quality of life (QOL) in patients diagnosed with schizophrenia that are under involuntary commitment. METHODS: A cross-sectional epidemiological study was carried out on patients from a penitentiary hospital. The survey was conductid by a social-demographic questionnaire and the Quality of Life Scale (QLS-BR), specific for patients diagnosed with schizophrenia. A descriptive and multivariate analysis was performed. The association between the scores of QOL and the clinical, social-demographic and felony characteristics was obtained by multivariate analysis, using a resource the decision tree, by means of the Chi-squared Automatic Interaction Detector (CHAID) algorithm. RESULTS: 54 people participated in this study, of which 90.7% were male, with an average age of 40 years old. All the domains of quality of life, including the global one, presented scores compatible with a very low QOL. The occupational domain showed to be the most affected one. Long lasting disease, having commited homicide and being over 40 years old were the variables associated to a low quality of life in the multivariate analysis. CONCLUSION: A low QOL was noticed among the patients that are under involuntary commitment, a reality that needs to be modified by making possible changes in Brazilian policies.
Schizophrenia; quality of life; custody order; nursing
