2747 – The Psychiatric Expertise in Tunisia: Socio-Demographic Characteristics of 120 Appraised Persons

Abstract

Introduction:

The psychiatric expertise, medical discipline in the legal system, is an act in which the expert must establish the existence of mental illness at the time of the offense and the latter results.

Objective:

Describe the socio-demographic profile of the subjects appraised in order to help to improve and clarify the mission of expertise.

Materials and methods:

Retrospective study, involving 120 subjects examined records within a forensic psychiatric assessment over a period ranging from January 2004 to May 2009. Socio-demographic data collected were processed using Microsoft Excel. Our results were compared with those of literature.

Results:

Our series consisted of 113 men and 7 women representing 94.1% and 5.9% (sex ratio F / M = 1/16). The average age was 34 years 2 months with a peak at 20-29 years (41% of cases). A solitary life characterized 70.0% of the subjects examined, with a predominance of single (64.2%). Educational level was relatively low and the employment situation was precarious for the majority of subjects with a frequency up to 35% without occupation.

Conclusion:

At the end of this study, we find that the socio-demographic and clinical profile of subjects appraised consistent with conventio.