Posthospital mandatory outpatient treatment.

Mandatory outpatient treatment invoked after the patient has improved in the hospital is a relatively new development. Tennessee instituted this policy by statute in 1981. While people placed under the constraints of that law showed a reduction in rate of readmission, comparison with control groups failed to support the conclusion that these results are due to the forced outpatient constraints. The author discusses some procedure and policy considerations that stem from these findings.