30 Materials and methods The setting The study was conducted at the two largest public psy- chiatric hospitals in Stockholm County (1.9 million inhabitants) serving 289,000 and 400,000 people, respec- tively. Both hospitals provide voluntary as well as invol- untary care. Patients were recruited from the two general psychiatric wards at the ﬁrst hospital and from seven general psychiatric wards at the second hospital (excluding a ward negative to research). Patients were also recruited from the emergency unit at the second hospital, which serves the entire Stockholm County. This unit admits any individual for acute psychiatric evaluation and treatment. Prior psychiatric contact or referral by a third party is not required. The clinician may decide to admit the patient, to let the patient stay over night for observation, or to advise the person to return home. Health care in Sweden, of any kind, is provided at a low cost to the individual who instead pays through general taxation. The private sector in psychiatry was, at the time of the study, small and of marginal importance. Treatment of patients with psychoactive substance dependence dis- orders in Stockholm County is run by a separate organi- sation, albeit co-morbidity is often seen in general psychiatry. Soc Psychiat Epidemiol (2011) 46:29–34 Cases Psychiatric patients eligible for the study were between 18 and 60 years of age and returning home after an acute con- sultation or admission at any of the two hospitals and had a Swedish social security number (needed for access to records and national registers) and had a clinical ICD diagnosis [26] and had capacity to pursue an interview in Swedish or English. We chose to use the clinical diagnoses rather than conduct a speciﬁc diagnostic research interview, for two reasons; the exact diagnosis was not a main focus of the study and an extension of the research interview might have jeopardised the response rate and data quality. Approximately 512 patients from the inpatient units of the two hospitals and 463 patients from the psychiatric emergency unit were eligible for the study. Thus, approx- imately 975 patients were eligible, 497 were approached (50%) and 390 patients accepted to participate (78% of all approached). Those who were not approached had left the hospital at a time when the research assistant was off duty (evenings, nights, weekends and holidays), and therefore no information about the non-approached patients could be retrieved. There were no signiﬁcant difference between participants and refusals in terms of gender, age, diagnosis, admitted/not admitted, length of admission, voluntary/ involuntary care, and which hospital was concerned (Table 1). Table 1 Victimisation among psychiatric patients in Stockholm: socio-demographic and clinical characteristics of cases, controls and refusals * Not known ** Not applicable 123 Gender Female Male Mean age (SD) Born in Sweden Monthly income [1,000€ 1,000–2,000€ \2,000€ Diagnosis Mood disorder (F30–F39) Psychosis (F20–F29) Personality disorder (F60–F61) Dependence disorder (F10–F19) Other (all other) Admission Involuntary treatment Mean duration of hospitalisation (days) (SD) Hospital Hospital I Hospital II Cases (n = 390) 203 (52%) 187 (48%) 36.6 (11.8) 285 (73%) 191 (49%) 156 (40%) 43 (11%) 124 (32%) 76 (20%) 55 (14%) 22 (6%) 111 (28%) 272 (67%) 105 (27%) 17.2 (23.3) 351 (90%) 39 (10%) Controls (n = 1,170) 609 (52%) 561 (48%) 36.6 (11.8) 931 (80%) 334 (29%) 312 (27%) 524 (45%) ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** Refusals (n = 107) 50 (47%) 57 (53%) 36.9 (11.5) * * * * 27 (26%) 25 (23%) 5 (5%) 7 (6%) 43 (40%) 65 (61%) 30 (28%) 14.3 (23.5) 96 (90%) 11 (10%)