Factors Associated to the Onset of Mental Illness Among Hospitalized Migrants to Italy: A Chart Review
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ORIGINAL PAPER
Factors Associated to the Onset of Mental Illness Among Hospitalized Migrants to Italy: A Chart Review Antonio Ventriglio1 · Antonello Bellomo1 · Annamaria Petito1 · Marco Pascucci1 · Edwige Cuozzo1 · Giovanna Vitrani1 · Eleonora Stella1 · Luisa Borraccino1 · Maria Pia Varlese1 · Dinesh Bhugra2 Accepted: 1 October 2020 © Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature 2020
Abstract Migration is a complex phenomenon and mental illness among immigrants remains a major matter of concern in Italy and worldwide. 243 medical and pharmacy records of patients admitted to University of Foggia hospital between 2004 and 2018 were retrospectively screened and included in the study. Socio-demographic data and clinical characteristics of inpatients were compared in those with and without first-episode of mental illness (FEMI). Subjects (140 men, 103 women; aged 34.4 ± 10.2 years) represented 6.66 ± 3.73% of all hospitalizations in 15 years. Nearly half of them (48.5%) had emigrated from other European countries. 30.8% were diagnosed with a DSM-IV TR unspecified psychosis. 103 patients (42.3%) were in first-lifetime episodes of mental illness. Factors significantly associated with FEMI were: younger age, sex (men), immigrating from Africa, poor language proficiency, lower amount of prescribed psychotropics. Mental health among immigrants is of major concern in Italy. Our findings report on factors possibly associated to the onset of mental illness among immigrant psychiatric inpatients. Keywords Immigrants · Mental illness · First-episode · Hospitalization · Italy
Introduction Immigration to Italy has increased rapidly in the past few decades, mostly due to the international political changes, particularly in the Middle East and North Africa: due to its geographical position, Italy has been accepting immigrants crossing the Mediterranean Sea from North Africa coast (as a subscriber of United Nations Convention of the Sea), as well as immigrants from Arab Spring in Tunisia or Civil War in Libya [1]. The Italian National Statistics Institute (ISTAT) in 2019 reported that the percentage of immigrants in Italy reached 8.9% of general population (60.3 million people) with 307.000 new residence registrations from abroad [1]. The new immigration flows from non-EU countries have been involving the North of Italy, mostly Lombardy (56%), since only 23% of total migrant-permits have been issued * Antonio Ventriglio [email protected] 1
Department of Clinical and Experimental Medicine, University of Foggia, presso Policlinico “Riuniti” di Foggia, Foggia 71121, Italy
Institute of Psychiatry, King’s College, London, UK
2
in the South of Italy and the Islands (Sardinia and Sicily; 2). It has also been estimated that 3.7 million immigrants have been entering the country illegally over the years and many of them still are undocumented [2]. For instance, in 2019, the maximum number of migrants were from Romania (23%), followed by Asia (all 20%; including China 5%) and Africa (all 20%; including Moro
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