The Spanish psychiatric reform in perspective: achievements, pending issues, and the crisis

• Main Author: Francisco Torres-González
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Medwave Estudios Limitada 2012-11-01
• Series: Medwave
• Subjects: psychiatric reform; psychiatry; asylum model; mental health; mental health centers
• Online Access: http://dx.doi.org/10.5867/medwave.2012.09.5543

In order to analyze the Spanish psychiatric reform, this conference starts from the old dilemma of where to care for the disturbed, that began with Hospital de Ignoscents in the fifteenth century, to the asylum model of the nineteenth century that subsequently became the international reference model, to the most contemporary forms of care based on the open door system that combine institutionalization with ambulatory care for the less compromised patients. The article questions the asylum model and says that the community is an alternative to psychiatric hospitals. The article goes on to describe the process of institutionalization of the psychiatric reform in Spain and includes data con population, territory and human resources in mental health.