Compares Vietnamese refugees’ satisfaction with mainstream mental health services and with specialized refugee services to determine whether services targeted to their ethnic group were deemed superior to the mainstream counterparts. Study subjects were 86 Vietnamese refugees living in southwest Sydney, Australia, who had received psychiatric treatment over a 12-month period in the inpatient units of 2 general hospitals, associated community health centers, and the specialized mental health service for refugees. None of the patients who had attended the specialized refugee service had been treated in the mainstream settings, and vice versa. Among the key findings were that patients attending the specialized refugee service reported being more satisfied than did those attending mainstream services; and patients attending the specialized refugee service also reported greater satisfaction with the information they received, the way the treatment plan was explained and their diagnosis communicated to them, and the ease of negotiating changes in treatment. Further research is needed to understand why the services provided by the specialized program for refugees are more acceptable to both patients and their families.
