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Background: Limited data is available for family burden in anxiety disorders such as obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), particularly from the developing world where families are the primary source of support for patients. Aim: To compare family burden in patients with OCD and schizophrenia in an Indian setting and to examine the influence of caregivers' demographics, patients' illness severity and disability on family burden. Method: This comparative cross-sectional study assessed family burden in key relatives of patients with OCD (n = 50) and schizophrenia (n = 30) respectively. Results: Indian families experience significant degrees of burden in the care of their relatives with OCD and schizophrenia. Key relatives' demographic characteristics did not influence burden severity. Illness severity and patients' disability had a direct positive relationship with perceived family burden. Conclusion: Indian families of patients with OCD experience burden comparable to that of families of patients with schizophrenia. There is a need to develop local needs-based support programmes for families of patients with psychiatric disorders in India. Key words: burden, schizophrenia, obsessive-compulsive disorder

Background: Discrepancies in the experiences of different ethnic groups in mental health services exist, such as in the persistently higher rates of schizophrenia diagnosis found among the African-Caribbean population compared to the white European population in the UK. Some hypotheses consider whether this is due to greater stigmatizing attitudes to mental illness in the African-Caribbean community, leading individuals to avoid treatment-seeking and an increased incidence of schizophrenia. This study aimed to investigate recognition and evaluation of schizophrenic symptoms across African-Caribbean and white European individuals. Method: One hundred and twenty eight adult students from London colleges completed a questionnaire assessing stigma beliefs, evaluation of symptoms as mental illness and help-seeking beliefs, in response to symptom vignettes. Results and Discussion: African-Caribbean participants indicated less stigmatizing beliefs towards both the symptoms and diagnostic label of schizophrenia compared to the white European participants. White European participants were more likely to label vignettes as implying 'mental illness' and also more likely to recommend professional health treatment. These results are inconsistent with a hypothesis that on average African-Caribbean people stigmatize schizophrenia more than white European people. While white European participants' beliefs were more likely to follow a western model of mental illness, African-Caribbean participants were more likely to have alternative beliefs. The influence of racial discrimination, mental illness knowledge and societal structures are discussed. Key words: beliefs, schizophrenia, African-Caribbean, White-European, diagnostic label, cross-cultural

Demographic and clinical characteristics of 275 schizophrenics consecutively admitted to seven hospitals were examined. Males were younger than females when first hospitalized, diagnosed and treated. Psychiatrists rated on two rating scales by using a structured interview to compare the symptomatology. Female schizophrenics were more agitated, inappropriate, silly, irrelevant, over-talkative, and exhibiting more flight of ideas, while male schizophrenics were more slowed, hypoactive, grandiose, withdrawn, and showing more blocking, auditory hallucinations and poor communications. Katz Adjustment Scales were rated by the patients and their relatives. Female schizophrenics were perceived by relatives to be more helpless and withdrawn-depressed than male schizophrenics.