Long-term hospitalization is becoming an increasingly specialized form of psychiatric treatment. The specialization involves not only training and orientation but also geographical location. As more state hospital systems "deinstitutionalize" and more private hospitals concentrate on short-term treatment, a recommendation for long-term hospital treatment is coming to mean, in most areas of the country, a referral to an institution far from the patient's home. The consecutive deaths by suicide of two out-of-state patients in one hospital that offers long-term treatment led to an investigation of a possible connection between suicide and hospitalization at a distance from home.