[Age-, gender- and diagnosis-specific changes of body concept during stationary psychosomatic treatment]

Abstract

Objective: This study investigates body concept with respect to psychiatric diagnosis, age and gender of inpatients before and after treatment.

Methods/sample: We examined 153 inpatients with 131 complete datasets. The examination was done at the beginning and at the end of the treatment using the Frankfurt Body Concept Scale (FKKS, Deusinger 1998). The results were calculated by t-test for dependent samples, posthoc Scheffé-tests and univariate variance analysis.

Results: The diagnoses indicated a more positive body concept at the end of the treatment (patients with somatoform disorder had effect sizes between -0.2 and -0.4, patients with depressions between -0.4 and -0.7, and patients with eating disorders between -0.3 and -0.7). Gender and age had only little influence on the positive changes.

Discussion: The improvement of body concept through inpatient treatment represents a challenge especially for somatoform disorders. The duration of this improvement after inpatient treatment needs further investigation.