A study sample consisting of 51 patients suffering from acute and transient psychotic disorder (ATPD) (ICD-10) on initial examination was evaluated at 1-year follow-up. The findings show a diagnostic change in half of the patients (48%), most often to schizophrenia (15%) and affective disorder (28%). From index admission to follow-up, patients with an unchanged diagnosis of ATPD manage fairly well with regard to psychosocial functioning, and no deteriorating development is observed. In the majority of cases no personality disorder (PD) (ICD-10, 54%; DSM-IV, 71%) is apparent, and the ATPD is not related to any specific PD. With regard to diagnostic stability, no significant demographic, social or clinical predictors were found. The findings highlight the need for validation of the concept of ATPD, and point to the fact that brief psychotic episodes with an acute onset may be an early manifestation of severe mental disorder (schizophrenia and affective disorder).

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Children of women with schizophrenia have a considerable increased risk of death caused by sudden infant death syndrome. However, the results should be interpreted in the light of failure to adjust for socioeconomic status, substance abuse, smoking status, and psychotropic medication use.

Disturbed identity is one of the defining characteristics of Borderline Personality Disorder manifested in a broad spectrum of dysfunctions related to the self, including disturbances in meaning-generating self-narratives. Autobiographical memories are memories of personal events that provide crucial building-blocks in our construction of a life-story, self-concept, and a meaning-generating narrative identity. The cultural life script represents culturally shared expectations as to the order and timing of life events in a prototypical life course within a given culture. It is used to organize one's autobiographical memories. Here, 17 BPD-patients, 14 OCD-patients, and 23 non-clinical controls generated three important autobiographical memories and their conceptions of the cultural life script. BPD-patients reported substantially more negative memories, fewer of their memories were of prototypical life script events, their memory narratives were less coherent and more disoriented, and the overall typicality of their life scripts was lower as compared with the other two groups.

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