Preoccupation with death in schizophrenic men.

A systemic review of psychiatric histories of 205 hospitalized, schizophrenic men (veterans) revealed that 80 had expressed fear of dying, being killed, of no longer existing, or other evidence of preoccupation with death. These expressions of fear appeared either at the clinical onset of the psychosis, or during exacerbations, and often coincided with schizophrenic panic. The similarity of expressions of the fear among the patients was striking, and they were practically indentical from one exacerbation to the next. This consistency suggests that the fear of death stems from schizophrenic psychopathology rather than from individual situational influence. The explicitly stated preoccupation with death was quite common in this sample (40%), and contrary to expectation, was not limited to cases with favorable outcome.