Abstract
Background: This is one of a number of programmatic studies on the allocation of scarce medical resources.Aims: This study investigated whether certain characteristics about patients influence the priority they are assigned for a scarce mental health treatment. Similar studies for physical treatments have found that young, poor, and mentally healthy patients are given the highest priority.Method: Each participant completed one questionnaire where they ranked a list of eight hypothetical patients in order of priority for treatment for anorexia or obesity. The patients varied on three dimensions: age, social class and mental health history. This involved a ranking of prioritisation for treatment.Results: Participants gave the young patients, from a low social class background, who had a mental health history the highest priority for treatment. This is in contrast to previous studies indicating that the mentally unwell are discriminated against.Conclusions: Participants seemed to be using social class as a proxy measure of ability to pay which they weighted very highly.
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