Study concerning the sample dependency and temporal variance of the factor structure in the Inpatient Multidimensional Psychiatric Scale.

The stability of the symptom groupings within the Inpatient Multidimensional Psychiatric Scale (IMPS) was investigated using the psychopathological findings upon admission and at discharge in a collective consisting of 475 inpatients suffering predominantly from psychotic disorders. With respect to the admission data, this collective was enlarged by the addition of a second patient sample containing predominantly neurotic patients, so that the data of a total of 960 patients was available for the analysis of this mixed collective. The results of the factor analyses show, with the exception of the factor 'conceptual disorganization', very good agreement. Most factors could also be reproduced from the discharge data.