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The British Journal of Psychiatry (2004) 185: 505-510
© 2004 The Royal College of Psychiatrists

Factor structure in the Camberwell Assessment of Need

Erik Wennström, MSc

Department of Neuroscience, Psychiatry

Dag Sörbom, PhD

Department of Information Sciences, Statistics

Frits-Axel Wiesel, MD, PhD

Department of Neuroscience, Psychiatry, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden

Correspondence: Erik Wennström, Department of Neuroscience, Psychiatry, Ulleråker, SE-750 17, Uppsala, Sweden. Tel: +46 18 6112219; e-mail: erik.wennstrom{at}neuro.uu.se

Declaration of interest None.

Funding detailed in Acknowledgements.

Background In order to define needs for care of people with severe mental illness, the Camberwell Assessment of Need (CAN) is focused on measuring personal and social functioning. However, previous studies of the CAN have given inconsistent results in terms of what variables are actually being measured.

Aims To investigate the factor structure of the CAN.

Method Assessments of 741 out-patients (mean age 45.5 years, 50% females) with severe mental illness (68% schizophrenia or other psychotic disorder) were used in an exploratory maximum likelihood factor analysis.

Results Support was found for a three-factor model, comprising 13 of the 22 variables in the CAN, with the factors corresponding to functional disability (7 variables), social loneliness (3 variables) and emotional loneliness (3 variables). The remaining variables did not load on any factor.

Conclusions Exploratory factor analysis revealed three homogeneous dimensions in the CAN that may represent functional disability and two aspects of social health.




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