Criteria for expert evaluation of danger posed by schizophrenic women in cases of restricted parental rights

Abstract

Reviewed are the results of forensic psychiatric examination of 55 patients with schizophrenia аnd schizoaffective disorder who were involved in a civil suit concerning the restriction of parental rights. The relationship between the form and the type of progression of disease; the structure and degree of manifestation of productive and negative symptoms at the time the expert testimony was handed down; the reversibility of the symptoms; the relation between the psychical state and the level of social functioning; the quality of remission were established as factors that determine the future prognosis and the experts decision. The criteria of the expert assessment of the danger of leaving the child in maternal custody and the criteria for establishing the preservation of ability to exercise parental functions in women with schizophrenia are highlighted.